Fire Protection Podcast

Fire-Rated Ducting Systems - Luke Connery, PE

Episode Summary

Passive fire protection (HVAC ducting) discussion with Luke Connery, of Conquest Firespray.

Episode Notes

Luke and Drew sit down to catch up and chat about HVAC ducting fire protection. In the fire protection industry we are used to active systems such as suppression and sprinkler. Conquest FireSpray manufacturers and distributes a coated HVAC ducting system that surpasses other methods of gaining a fire rating on a ventilation system.

Full Transcript

Drew Slocum: (00:09):

This is episode 7 of the Fire Protection Podcast, powered by Inspect Point. Today my guest is Luke Connery. Luke is the Vice President and general manager of the Northeast Region at Conquest Fire Spray. Conquest Fire Spray is a manufacturer of fire rated ducting. It's really outside the realm of our, our regular, um, thoughts of fire protection, fire suppression, fire sprinkler, fire alarm. So I wanted to get a, a, a different perspective from somebody that has been in the industry for over 20 years. Uh, I've worked with Luke at, at Tyco back in the day and wanted to get his perspective on passive fire protection, where the industry's going, and how, uh, the H V A C systems and fire rating compared to active fire suppression systems. So, little different topic today. So I'd love, I'd love to, uh, get his take on it and hope you enjoy the podcast.

Drew Slocum: (01:06):

Yeah. I wanna welcome in, uh, Luke Connery. Uh, Luke is the, if I get this wrong, let me know, but you're the general manager, uh, vice president for the Northeast for Conquest Flame Bar. Um, I believe that's a fire rated ducting system for, uh, fire protection H V A C. It's kind of in the realm of what we do at Inspect point with some of the dampers and all that, but, you know, most of fire protection as we grew up with it. Yeah. Is sprinkler fire alarm, all that. So, wanted to have you on to, this is a whole different, more passive fire protection, so, yeah. Um, yeah. You expressed interest and Yeah. Let's, let's shoot. Yeah.

Luke Connery: (01:46):

Yeah. So, I mean, uh, first and foremost, thank you very much for having me on the platform, having me on the podcast here. Um, uh, you know, I spend a lot of time driving in the car doing commutes, uh, you know, on the way to customer sites, what have you. And, um, you know, you can listen to Sirius XM radio, you can listen to the radio, whatever it is, and Right. Maybe during football season, that's, uh, maybe I'll tune into some sports radio. But, you know, podcast is, uh, podcasting. It's a way to kind of dial in exactly what you're interested in. Yeah. And, uh, so I've been listening to yours. I think it's great. I think you're doing good work here. So, uh, thanks. Congratulations on the podcast. Yeah,

Drew Slocum: (02:25):

It'll, uh, it'll definitely get better. It's obviously evolving. Um, but again, you know, we've done a bunch of sprinkler style podcasts. I want to get more, you know, different realms of fire protection, including the H V A C side of things, which you brought up. I didn't, I don't know a lot of this. So, yeah. I guess what is, what is Flame Bar, you know, for just the general audience out there?

Luke Connery: (02:49):

Yeah. So you'll hear the name, uh, conquest Fire Spray, you'll hear Conquest Flame Bar, you'll hear just Flame Bar by itself. The product is is called Flame Bar. It's, it's fire rated duct. But I think in recent years we've taken it beyond just the duct work itself. It's really, you know, fire rated Duct Systems. Yeah. Um, you know, featuring, uh, you know, custom enclosures and, and you know, we, we manufacture, we fabricate the duct. Uh, we coat the duct. It all happens out of one of our two locations. Um, just outside of Detroit. We have a factory that's our headquarters in Warren, Michigan. Mm-hmm. . Then we have another, uh, plant down in Miramar, Florida. So it, you know, we do fire rated duct. Um, and so, you know, I just wanted to comment real quick. Yeah. You mentioned people think fire protection and people think sprinkler. People think, um,

Drew Slocum: (03:42):

Extinguishers fire alarms.

Luke Connery: (03:43):

Yeah, yeah. Suppression. The suppression, yeah. Suppression. The suppression side of the industry is the one that sort of, I guess, has more gravitational pull or people sort of defer to that when they hear the term fire protection. But you're right, it's bigger than that. Um, and so, um, this, this whole passive side, which Fire rated Duct fits into is a part of that. Um, it is a part of that bigger world mm-hmm. . Yeah. And it has its roots in sort of the code, the building code, the mechanical code, which from a fire protection standpoint, um, this is what sort of outlines how you build buildings, you know, uh, where the tradeoffs exist. And, uh, it's one of the most important, you know, uh, parts of, uh, building design is, you know, focusing on the code and what the code dictates and Yeah. Right. Uh, how the code is applied and, and what gets traded off when you're using some of these suppression systems, for example. Right. Um, and, and so, uh, so certainly, you know, um, so as it pertains to Flame Bar, fire rated Duct, you think of, you know, the example that comes to mind most frequently is, you know, towers or any kind of any building that's forced

Drew Slocum: (04:52):

Or high rises. Yeah,

Luke Connery: (04:53):

Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Four floors or more. Right. And, um, you know, when you're penetrating from a ventilation standpoint, those floors Yep. You wanna make sure that, you know, you're not inviting a fire to start on, you know, floor number two and move up to floor number 15. Right. Uh, so there's certain protectives that get put in place and sort of, um, you know, that's, that's where the code comes in. That's where fire rated Duct comes into that.

Drew Slocum: (05:20):

Gotcha.

Luke Connery: (05:21):

So where's

Drew Slocum: (05:22):

That? Is that in the ibc? Is that in jurisdictional building codes, or how, I don't, I don't know where the, the code's coming from

Luke Connery: (05:33):

At that point. So y yes, yes. So the IBC is the biggest part of that. Right. Uh, and it just depends on the jurisdiction as to which addition of the building code has been adopted. Mm-hmm. and, um, so here in Massachusetts, and uh, actually technically we're sitting in Rhode Island here, but in Massachusetts it's uh, seven 80 cmr. So it relies on the 2015 version of the ibc. Okay. Um, and then also the 2015 version of the IMC is referenced the International Mechanical Code. Yep. And, um, and that drives a lot of what we do and within the building code, you know, you know, one of the things that we deal with quite a bit with fire rated duct is this idea of symmetry. Um, yeah, I think you were probably like five years old when you first heard, you're only as strong as your weakest link .

(06:26)
Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Well, that applies to materials used in construction, especially fire rated materials. And so if you have a, a wall assembly, right. You know, when you test it in the furnace, in these fire tests, right? Mm-hmm. , you'll hear me reference probably a S D m E one 19, um, you know, which, which will the temperatures go to 2000 degrees. Wow. Not only do the temperatures, not only does that assembly need to work on this side of the wall, but it also needs to work on the other, the other side of the wall. Right. Right. And everything throughout the building is tested that way. Okay. So

Drew Slocum: (07:01):

Is that assembly, sorry to go back, but that, that ASTM standard, you're testing that duct work or whatever, uh, you're doing in, in a furnace.

Luke Connery: (07:11):

That's exactly right. And you know which furnace has, you know, furnace will have size limitations to it. Sure. But you know, I mean, these are pretty big, these are big furnaces. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So UL will build a furnace, uh, you know, Intertech labs will build a furnace. There's okay. A bunch of other laboratories across the world that have these furnaces that run the same or similar time temperature curves to get up to that 2000 degrees, which is the temperatures that you see in a fire. Yep. Whether it's a 45 minute, one hour, two hour, four hour Yep. Fire resistance rating. Okay. And so it's important for, uh, uh, the materials used in construction to perform in a symmetric way, uh, to those, or at those temperatures. So with fire rated duct, a lot of what's been done for the past 10, 20, 30 years Yep. Is exposure only to one side of that.

Drew Slocum: (08:04):

Oh, okay.

Luke Connery: (08:05):

Interesting. So, so especially here in North America. Right. Um, and you just have, it's called, you know, strong side exposure or duct a, which is fire those 2000 degree temperatures. Yep. Outside the duct only.

Drew Slocum: (08:19):

Okay. Not inside, just

Luke Connery: (08:21):

Outta the, what about strong side, the temperatures on the inside of the duct. Right. Right. Why is that not important or less important? Right. In fire rated ducts of all places. Yeah.

Drew Slocum: (08:31):

Cuz they heat transferring inside if there's a fire.

Luke Connery: (08:33):

Well, it could, I mean, some of these, you know, plenums, which might be fire rated plenums, big intake plenums on the side of modern commercial building mm-hmm. might be the size of a school bus.

(08:44)
Oh right. Yeah. And if you have a truck fire or if you have a external cladding fire or whatever it might be, you're gonna be taking hot gases right. Into that intake plant and Oh yeah. If you're not protected on inside of that duct Sure. Or if you don't have listings that sort of show you how to install your product so that it protects the inside of that duct, that's called weak side exposure or duct B. Okay. So you can go out there and see these duct B listings. Yeah. UL has duct B listings, Intertech has duct B listings. You really wanna see that duct B you know, sort of, uh, uh, listing associated with these products in order to be compliant with the code. Right. And so really what happens, uh, what we find happening is people doing kind of the status quo, cuz they've done it that way for 20 or 30 years, you know, they'll use a product that UL ultimately only has like a, you know, auc a listing. Yeah. Right. And um, most of it has to do with lack of education. Yeah. But there's also commercial forces that are at play. These tend to be sort of cost, you know Yeah. Cheaper solutions. Right. And we're not talking order of magnitude, we're not talking. These things cost even. It might

Drew Slocum: (09:51):

Be cheaper for the product, but for the overall project might not be cheaper.

Luke Connery: (09:56):

Right. Well, yeah. And, and, and the question that you've gotta answer is, are you willing to trade reduced fire and life safety? Mm-hmm. , if your kids are in this building, are you willing to trade, um, you know, reduced fire safety? Right. Um, for 10% Yeah. Of the cost. Right. In terms of in cost reduction mm-hmm. and that's, that's the game that we play. Or, or that that's the message that we try to send

Drew Slocum: (10:21):

Trying into the code, really into the margin. Yeah. Drive that code a

Luke Connery: (10:24):

Little bit. We're working on all, on all aspects. So Yeah. Engineers, you know, conquest is, we're about, um, you know, 50 people mm-hmm. and we're broken out into a few regions. We're really big down in Florida, uh, Boston, we've been here for years mm-hmm. in the northeast New York, you know, the eastern seaboard. Yeah. We're out in San Francisco. The Midwest is starting to grow. Right. Uh, in, in terms of, um, you know, demand for the product. So, um, yeah. It's, I mean, drew, we're Todd fucking engineers, architects, general contractors, right. Uh, mechanicals sheet metal contractors, drywallers Yeah. And everybody in between.

Drew Slocum: (11:03):

How, how do the sheet metal contractors compared to the sprinkler suppression world?

Luke Connery: (11:08):

,

Drew Slocum: (11:09):

I, you know, my sister's an H V HD contractors, but I don't, I don't know what the whole industry is.

Luke Connery: (11:14):

Yeah. You know, there's a lot of similarities I gotta say. Yeah. I mean, heck, some of 'em, there's even overlaps. I mean, some people are doing H V A C contracting and sprinkler contract, right?

Drew Slocum: (11:24):

Yeah. Yeah. We have some big users of inspect point that are doing both that are Yeah. Inspecting dampers, duct work, stuff like

Luke Connery: (11:30):

That. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, um, look, contracting is contracting at some level and, um, you know, I think you have folks who are more enlightened and, and wanna do the right thing and are willing to sort of drive that message along with you mm-hmm. and they go shoulder to shoulder and help everybody that they're talking to, to understand the importance of duct B and symmetry in these fire protection systems. Right. Uh, and you have other people that are, you know, um, more likely to do what they've always done because, I mean, heck, you know, in the Northeast it's so busy, there's so much work happening.

Drew Slocum: (12:06):

Yeah. It's very busy right now.

Luke Connery: (12:07):

It's not a question of can I do the right thing? It's can I do the thing that'll be accepted? Yeah. And can I do that as fast as I can? Yeah. Cause there's so much work to go get right now. Yeah. Uh, that that's what people are, you know, that's their primary

Drew Slocum: (12:20):

Objective. When do you, when do you think the slowdown, there's gotta be a slowdown here soon?

Luke Connery: (12:24):

Yeah. I mean, you know, knock on wood and, um, you know, what you do. Here are some of these contractors talking about Oh. All across the value chain. Right. Um, 2023

Drew Slocum: (12:35):

Isn't

Luke Connery: (12:35):

That far. 2024. Wow. Yeah. So these projects are, you know, gonna be wrapping up at that point. But you gotta think, you know, the design community is doing work right now.

Drew Slocum: (12:45):

Yeah. So, yeah. Right. That's, that's always been a few years out. Right.

Luke Connery: (12:48):

So if those guys are doing work now, then you gotta think it's gonna, you know, carry past those dates. Yep. So it, it is, it's crazy how many cranes are on the horizon. Yep. In greater Boston. And I'm sure in many other parts of the country right now, I

Drew Slocum: (13:03):

Think, what's it, Toronto's got the most right now. He was talking, I think he was talking to my brother. Toronto's got a a ton. Seattle's got a ton. New York's still got a lot. Yeah. But Toronto for some reason

Luke Connery: (13:16):

Is, you know, I've heard that. Yeah,

Drew Slocum: (13:18):

I've heard that. It's blowing up. Um,

Luke Connery: (13:20):

You know, it's good.

Drew Slocum: (13:20):

Great. Yeah,

Luke Connery: (13:21):

It's, it's really good. I I was even hearing that, uh, all the way down through, you know, K through 12 construction. I mean, you know, the type of construction cuz construction in the high demand environment is expensive. Mm-hmm. . So typically you have like, you know, institutional, you know, construction work happening in the down market when they can get construction for cheap.

Drew Slocum: (13:41):

Right.

Luke Connery: (13:42):

But all that's hitting on all cylinders Yeah. Right now. Yeah. So it's just a, a crazy time to be in the construction industry.

Drew Slocum: (13:49):

No, it is. It's, it's, uh, you know, ever since that little, little blip in the late two thousands, it's been been pretty strong. So, yeah. So, uh, back to this flame bar. You gave me a little, uh, nice little coaster here.

Luke Connery: (14:02):

,

Drew Slocum: (14:03):

Um, put my beer

Luke Connery: (14:05):

On it. I know it. Right.

Drew Slocum: (14:07):

Uh, what is, all right. So it's a, we're on a podcast, you really can't see, and I'm not Eventually we'll be videoing this, but, um, it's a piece of galvanized duct on one side with Luke's info. And on the other side is a, is a coating. Uh, I guess what, what's the coding made of?

Luke Connery: (14:27):

Um,

Drew Slocum: (14:27):

Uh, if you can tell

Luke Connery: (14:29):

Me it's proprietary. All

Drew Slocum: (14:30):

Right.

Luke Connery: (14:31):

But I can describe it for you. Um, it's, um, it's an endothermic Okay. A ablative coating in an elastomeric binder. All you gotta explain, which, which which we put onto, excuse me, uh, sheet metal. And that sheet metal can be, you know, galvanized sheet metal can be stainless steel, but you know, the endothermic piece, you know, obviously it, you know when in, in fire conditions when you have high temperatures Yeah. You know, it'll activate the chemical coating and the, the chemical reaction starts to take place and you're gonna remove heat energy from, you know, the underlying substrate in this case, the sheet metal.

Drew Slocum: (15:09):

Okay. So sucking the heat out,

Luke Connery: (15:10):

You're gonna pull the heat outta the sheet metal. The ablative piece speaks to sort of how it does that mm-hmm. . So the chemical reaction lets off, in this case it's, you know, water vapor and, uh, you know, similar to how, you know, drywall works in that same furnace test mm-hmm. , uh, or if you've ever boiled a pot of water mm-hmm. , you've seen, you know, the creation of steam. Right. I mean, think about that. What you've got is, you know, a thousand degree temperatures underneath your pot of water, but inside the pot you have water, which is gonna stay at 212 degrees. Right, cool. Relative to the underside of the pot. Right. Correct. Until all the water's gone tell,

Drew Slocum: (15:45):

And Yeah.

Luke Connery: (15:45):

Well, the BW 11 coating, and that's what we call it at, um, it's called the BW 11 coating it, um, it'll last you for up to four hours in fire testing Wow. At 2000 degrees. Wow. Yeah. And, and it'll continue to liberate water vapor and it maintains that sort of temperature, a lower temperature for the underlying steel and the ablated, oh, sorry. The, um, elastomeric binder. Look, here's the thing about fire rated duct. It's in fires. Okay. Right, right. Okay. So you have 2000 degree temperatures, what happens to metal and specifically steel. Yeah. When you heat it up to 2000 degrees, you're gonna have elongation. Yeah. You're gonna have deformation. The duct is gonna want to twist and do crazy stuff. Yeah. Uh, in the dynamic fire condition. And you want that coating to stay on the steel. And that's the elastomeric binder part. So Oh,

Drew Slocum: (16:37):

Oh, oh.

Luke Connery: (16:38):

Yeah. So once you've got the coating on there, uh, the elastomeric nature of the BW 11 coding allows it to stay there. So we talked through some of the nitty gritty there, drew. Sure. But what's important to understand is, you know, we've got UL listed, intertech listed product Yep. Where, you know, all the dynamics that go into these tests have the, the question is, have you passed the test or have you not passed the test? Right. Right. And if you can go find the listing card that talks about how to install, you know, with these listings, these duct b sort of symmetry, uh, uh, showcasing symmetry listings, duct B listings, you've successfully passed the test.

Drew Slocum: (17:19):

Gotcha.

Luke Connery: (17:20):

So that's all right. That's kind of, uh,

Drew Slocum: (17:24):

It is, it is a pretty cool coding. I mean, if, if it's on the outside of a, a duct work, I, you've probably custom color this and whatever else.

Luke Connery: (17:31):

Yeah, yeah. Um, um, Marlin's Stadium, we, we, one of the partners, Dick McCullough, he is always, always talking about, uh, one of the big projects he worked on was, um, you know, Marlin Stadium? Yeah. There's, there's smoke control system down there. It's all, you know, so all the, the flame bars installed throughout that stadium Sure. And it's all sort of Marlin's blue.

Drew Slocum: (17:51):

Oh, nice. Yeah. Yeah. Is it a specific paint? I was in the painting industry early on, so is a specific painting. I'm

Luke Connery: (17:57):

Sure there's some You

Drew Slocum: (17:59):

Just paint it. Do you guys paint it? Or,

Luke Connery: (18:00):

Oh, oh, oh. Um, so we don't, but it can be painted in the field and Oh, right. It's a water soluble coating. Oh, wow. So you can hit it with dry lock to keep water off of it. Sure. It can take water and it will dry off. And it does not impact the performance of the coating. You just, you don't want it to, to freeze. Uh, and if it's gonna be exposed to any of the elements, you'll want it, we can dry lock it for you. Right. So it won't take on the water so you don't have that freeze potential. Yeah. But the answer to your question is, it would get painted in the field by somebody who knows what Mar Marlin's blue looks like, . And they can go in and, and Right. You know, probably spray the duct. Yeah.

Drew Slocum: (18:38):

Spray it. Yeah. That's cool. All I had a, I had a question for you here. Sure. So the, uh, you know, my experience in just being in fire protection ever since being at inspect point, getting into, involved in a lot of different areas of fire protection, um, one that was new to me was, uh, fire dampers, which, you know, I was asking you before about this, you know, there's a lot of contractors that new that do sprinkler fire alarm extinguishers, fire doors, whatever, fire dampers, its own little niche. But some contractors do fire damper inspections mm-hmm. , which in my opinion is not, it's not really being focused on that much cuz you install this big H V A C system, why aren't you, why aren't you inspecting and maintaining the duct or, you know, the duct work dampers. Yeah. Um, how does this work with dampers? Is it in a, you know, how how does that

Luke Connery: (19:35):

Explain that? So, I mean, so dampers get used, anyti dampers get used in a lot of different places. But as it pertains to fire rated duct, I mean, anytime you're transitioning from a fire rated enclosure, uh, duct being one of those enclosures, um, uh, out to non-fire rated, you would, you would separate the two with a damper. Yeah. And the idea is that in the case of a fire condition where you've got 2000 degrees again, right. And the non-fire rated component component of the duct, you know, a, a MNA a sort of minimum build mm-hmm. , you know, the, the duct that you see in most places in buildings, you know, begins to elongate, begins to deform and ends up falling away. I mean, that's the, in the hypothetical Right. You would drop that duct out of the sky. Right? Yeah. You don't want the fire or the smoke, the products of combustion to enter into that fire rated duct and spread throughout the building.

(20:31)
Yeah. It's all about keeping the fire on the floor origin of origin. Right. And so you'd have a damper there. So dampers are important to maintain sort of the integrity, um, and the continuity of these, um, you know, fire rated, uh, uh, compartments mm-hmm. . Um, so, you know, you know, the contractors that, that I deal with, um, do place a priority on accessing fire dampers fire and smoke dampers for maintenance purposes. And this, it's very important Right. Because you want them to work. Right. If they fail, or, you know, um, yeah. I mean, if they fail, then you're not gonna be able to protect your fire rated Correct. Integrity. And that's not a good thing. Right. You're gonna have a lot of, uh, um, um, you frankly, you could be exposing your fire and life safety system to the fire, which is what it's designed to prevent. Right? Right.

Drew Slocum: (21:25):

Exactly.

Luke Connery: (21:27):

So, you know, one of the applications for Flame bar, fire rated duct actually is, um, uh, um, uh, damper replacement, but we'll put that on hold for a second. We'll talk about damper relocation. Okay. So like, let's say that you had to have a damper, there's a penetration that's on like the third floor of an atrium floating in the middle of the sky. Right. You

Drew Slocum: (21:49):

Can't really get up there

Luke Connery: (21:50):

To Yeah. It's behind some kind of architectural feature. Right. And you can't get up there to service that damper location. Well, you could use flame, flame bar to basically offset that location mm-hmm. and you could, you could put it wherever it's convenient. Okay. So you might grow, you know, uh, some flame bar off the side of that riser 25 feet to a place or a compartment where you do have really easy access for that damper. Right. And you could use Flame Bar to do that.

Drew Slocum: (22:17):

Interesting. Yeah. Huh. So it could, you could use it as in congestion. It's not always just a replacement. It's

Luke Connery: (22:23):

Absolutely. That's great. So we had, I had a contractor this morning talking about clean room and exactly what we just talked about mm-hmm. because of how tight the space was behind the fire rated walls that surround the clean room, they couldn't locate a damper there and they had to basically extend it. And we talked through this and, you know, we, we can provide them with the listing cards and the justification. Oh wow. And, um, yeah, it's big news and it's pretty handy for a lot of people because it, um, again, coming back to the maintenance coming

Drew Slocum: (22:53):

Back. Yeah. I, I've always, you know, from, you know, from the, uh, get involved in the inspection, testing and maintenance of dampers. I I didn't know it was, it, it's, it's weird. It's, there's pockets where it's strong, you know, it depends on certain buildings as well. But you install these huge H V A C systems, you think you would wanna maintain them. Yeah. Obviously the heating cooling's very important. Yeah. You, you'd think that fire protection is just as important as well, so you'd maintain them. But I guess with Flame Bar, you don't need to worry about maintenance cuz it's essentially, it's eliminates some of that inspection, testing, maintenance.

Luke Connery: (23:30):

Yeah. That, I mean, that's true. That's true.

Drew Slocum: (23:32):

On

Luke Connery: (23:33):

A new, on a new, so, so here comes the damper replacement conversation. Yeah. . So like, so if you had, you know, a lot of the modern architecture will see, uh, you know, a shaft. So what does a shaft, but a separate sort of, uh, you know, fire resistance rated compartment that runs through multiple stories in a, in a, in a building mm-hmm. , well, some of these buildings have big shoulders on 'em and they get, you know, pointy and, and uh, you know, at the 50th floor. Right. Think about like downtown New York or something like that. Right. And, and then they keep going up toward the sky and then, you know, a lot of the mechanicals might be handled on the 50th floor. Right. Some of the mechanicals might keep going Sure. Keep going up. And so there might be a floor up there, maybe it's the 51st floor where a lot of the mechanicals transition from going vertical and they head horizontal Okay.

(24:22)
Uh, for that floor. And then we'll continue vertically. Yep. So what you could do is you could put dampers on, you know, the top of one of those shafts in the bottom of the, of the, the next shaft. Okay. And you could have, you know, a smack, not a minimum build connecting those two. Right. Or, you know, with the damper on either side. Right. Or you could replace those two dampers and the horizontal run with flame bar and it works the same way, huh. Yeah. So you don't need to have dampers in Sure. In, um, in certain

Drew Slocum: (24:50):

Certain

Luke Connery: (24:50):

Situations. In certain situations. Yeah.

Drew Slocum: (24:53):

Huh. Um, yeah, it's very interesting. You know, I'm, I'm, I'm really glad you reached out cuz you know, there's a, a whole industry out there that I, I, I didn't know was as big as it was in the H V C side. So, um, and I guess why you haven't been at Flint, you know a lot about H V A C. You only been there a few months, . So

Luke Connery: (25:17):

It's been a, a pretty, uh, tumultuous first, uh, yeah. Right. Six months. And we've got a guy, uh, Joe Hoff, uh, university of Maryland, uh, fire Protection Engineer. I'm a, uh, WPI guy myself. Right, right. But, uh, Joe Joe's a very knowledgeable individual and I've, I've learned a lot from him. And, um, you know, I mentioned Dick earlier. Um, and then also John Patillo, who is basically our liaison back over to, uh, fire Spray International, you know, the original company who developed Flame Bar, they're over in the uk. John's pretty well plugged into all the sort of codes and standards and listings activity, you know, they're, they're a normal, I mean, we, we, you and I drew both have a research and development background mm-hmm. , they do all the r and d over there at Fire Spray International, uh, conquest is a separate entity Okay. From Fire Spray International. But we still have a meeting of the mines in terms of r and d capacity. So John's the guy. So what I'm saying is I've learned a ton in a pretty short period of time, which that's what I like to do, you know. That's good.

(26:21)
Hey, the learning piece

Drew Slocum: (26:22):

Well rounded. I mean, you know, fire protection's a big, it's niche, but it's a very big niche, you know, kind of market. So

Luke Connery: (26:29):

It's a big umbrella. Yep.

Drew Slocum: (26:30):

What, um, I guess what do you, what do you like about working there versus, you know, previous experiences? What have your experiences in the past brought you Yeah. Brought to this position, I

Luke Connery: (26:42):

Guess? Yeah. So, I mean, I'm an engineer, um, but I really enjoy the customer conversations mm-hmm. and, uh, sort of the applications perspective. So there's a lot of people out there who want to do the right thing or they want to do a thing and they don't really know how. Right. You know, so it's almost, you know, sort of consulting to the customer space, if you will. Right. Uh, and sometimes that can be consultants, sometimes that can be architects. Sure. Uh, as I mentioned everybody else, you know, GCs, mechanicals, sheet metals and everybody in between. Right. Um, even authorities having jurisdiction at this point. I mean, one of the aspects that we've got going for us in the state of Massachusetts, and it's, there's a couple other jurisdictions, I think we have a declaratory statement down in Florida as well, but, you know, the, the Board of Building Regulations and Standards in Massachusetts, uh, and then the, uh, fire Protection, fire Prevention or the F P F P committee subset of the B B R S.

(27:43)
Right. They've basically issued a clarification on code requirements as it relates to fire rated duct. Right. So what's that all about? So what I'm saying, what happened there is they, the best and brightest in this space for a year, argued over this idea of symmetry as it pertains to fire rated duct. Oh, okay. And coming out of that was, Hey, look, we've argued it. Here's what we, here's what we've decided. Yeah. You need symmetry and fire rated duct, and here's the pathway for how fire rated duct can be designed for a project. Right. And that considers alternate means and methods, it considers modifications and variances and all that. Right. Well, how do you, how do you use that? How does an engineer use that day to day? How does an architect use that day to day? How does an inspector or plans reviewer evaluate an amr, an alternate means and methods request?

(28:41)
Mm-hmm. . So that's where I come in and that's where, that's what we do out there. So we're out there educating, helping people to understand this symmetry requirement for the building code and what to look for, what are the red flags mm-hmm. , you know, what's the Complica competition gonna try to do. Sure. Uh, to again, continue the status quo. And what we're trying to do is really transform the market Yep. Um, in a positive way from a fire and life safety standpoint. Right. So that's what's most interesting in this, uh, you know, working for Conquest, uh, uh, from, from my perspective is, you know, that's the charge. That's what gets me outta bed every day. Yeah. Uh, that's what brings me to all these discussions. That's why you and I are talking . I mean, we're out here making the world a better place, drew,

Drew Slocum: (29:28):

Trying to Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, you know, you were saying, you know, uh, did a little research as well on, on Conquest and there's a, there's been, in the fire protection space, it's, it's interesting cuz you know, up until it's probably the last 10 years, but it's, it's really been, uh, active, I would say in the, on the private equity venture capitalists and just investment side in the last five years. Strong. And honestly, what, what promoted me to do a lot of the stuff here at, at Spec point. But yeah, you guys just got a, a nice, nice little private equity bump. So Yeah. They, they obviously see the, uh, the, uh, the need for, for this application, and there's a huge future in it too. So, you know, wherever, wherever you see the money going is, there's, there's potential there. And there's, you know, there's a lot of focus on it right now.

Luke Connery: (30:24):

So this was, this was a long time coming and, um, you know, frankly, you know, it, it really solidifies sort of the future for Comcast Fire Spray. And, um, yeah. So the Pacific Growth Investors or pgi, they just, um, invested 29 million in the company and that sets us up for, you know, a continued expansion across North America. So, you know, I'm picking up in Boston where others have left off mm-hmm. , but we're gonna be opening markets all across the country. And, and you know what, you know, this industry mm-hmm. , um, you have people who are working in New York or in Boston that are designing projects in Omaha. Oh yeah. And in, you know, oh, yeah. Phoenix or wherever it might be. And there's folks in Phoenix who are designing work in Boston. Right. That's just the kind of the way it works. Sure.

(31:10)
So there's already projects happening all over the country and up into Canada. Uh, but we're gonna see just a continued presence there, uh, you know, for Conquest. So we're really excited. Yeah. And, uh, I'm excited to be here at this at this point. And, um, we, we've got the right leadership in place. I mean, every day I'm involved in a discussion around, you know, how can we do better? Yeah. What can we do better? Right. What do we need to focus on? Yeah. How can we communicate better? Um, and, and, and so people who are, you know, for a company to be that sort of self-reflective, if you will, it's just a really attractive, uh, that's good.

Drew Slocum: (31:49):

Yeah. Yeah. That smaller, you know, I feel like, um, we talked about it before, but, uh, you know, sometimes those, those, those smaller teams, you know, you get feel like you, you know, been corporate up until this point, you know, point and, uh, both of us. Yeah. Both. Oh, yeah. Right. You do. So it's like, uh, you know, those smaller teams Yeah. There's, there's challenges, but you get, you can get a lot done and you can really make a big presence. Uh, well

Luke Connery: (32:18):

Impact you matter. Yeah. , like, you know, cause cause if you're not doing your job there, I like that, you know, it's, uh, everyone's gonna pull their own weight. Right. Yeah. But the, but the other side of that is you're able to kind of pivot and move pretty quickly mm-hmm. in the most effective direction. Sure. So, Jim Miller, our, our managing partner, he, uh, he, you know, one of the things you hear from him frequently is, you know, how are you gonna spend your next hour?

Drew Slocum: (32:47):

Wow. Right.

Luke Connery: (32:48):

So we're not talking about like this

Drew Slocum: (32:50):

Week, five years this week

Luke Connery: (32:51):

Or next week or next month. We're talking about like today. Yeah. Right now. What are you doing? Yeah. And, uh, it's, it's refreshing.

Drew Slocum: (32:59):

I got that in an interview one time on sidebar in here, but, uh, it was an interview question. I, I think I was asked, I forgot what it was, but what did you eat for breakfast this morning? And what did you, you know, it was this weird That's

Luke Connery: (33:15):

A tough one. Yeah, right. In

Drew Slocum: (33:16):

An interview. And I actually started using it and he actually, you know, it gives you a little sense of, of what the person's about. Yeah. And if they give some, you know, canned answer. Yeah. You know, maybe

Luke Connery: (33:28):

They're can. Yeah. The only person that's asked me that question before Drew is like my doctor. And that's right before he frowned at my answer. So , I might've answered it wrong.

Drew Slocum: (33:38):

Chocolate donuts.

Luke Connery: (33:39):

Exactly. There might have been some sausage in

Drew Slocum: (33:42):

There. Who know? Right. Uh, all right, well, yeah, I would love to talk about this more and we'll, we'll obviously bring this offline a little bit, um, in a little bit. Uh, love to learn a little bit more as you, you know, grow with the company and, and all that. Certainly. So, uh, is there anything else you want to get out? Uh, you know, I'll give your information out at the end, but No,

Luke Connery: (34:05):

No. I mean, you know, I think the biggest thing, we talked about it, you know, for fire rated duct symmetry's important, you've gotta have, um, you know, uh, uh, strong side and weak side performance. And if you're gonna have one, have the weak side performance. Yeah. Cause that, that should be sort of the, um, you know, uh, uh, if you're gonna, in terms of fire rating, you wanna take that weak side test, then use that for your overall rating. Yeah. It's not the strong side because again, you're only as strong as your weakest link. So that's the important piece there. Um, we've recently just started to look at, you know, some fan enclosures, uh, for continuity of, of ventilation systems. So, you know, previously you would've had the upstream, upstream duct fire rated, the downstream duct fire rated. But this thing in the middle, uh, towering Yeah.

(34:50)
The ventilation system, you know, maybe there's a drywall box around it or something like that. But it certainly wasn't a fire rated installation. Now we offer these fan enclosures, which, which helped for continuity and fire rating across the whole system. Sure. And those were all duct B as well. So, you know, between that, you know, grease duct applications, I mean, really if you have a fire rated duct, um, you know, sort of question or aspect of your design, we'd like to be there helping you sort of work through it. And we can help you with specifications and, uh, with your overall designs. So. Cool.

Drew Slocum: (35:25):

Well, yeah. Let's, let's keep the, the talks going. Um, we're gonna do a little quick response round now. . Oh, geez. You were a little nervous about

Luke Connery: (35:35):

This. The pressure, the pressure's.

Drew Slocum: (35:37):

Yeah. Well, it's, it's pretty quick. So we're off

Luke Connery: (35:39):

Script.

Drew Slocum: (35:40):

Yeah. Off script. Um, I pretty much ask you a question. You gotta, you gotta give your answer yes or no or, um, one or the other.

Luke Connery: (35:49):

Don't, don't. I get a don't I get one? It depends. That's what I heard on the

Drew Slocum: (35:52):

Oh, yeah, yeah. You do. I, these, this, this won't be, it depends. These are pretty straightforward,

Luke Connery: (35:57):

So, okay, here

Drew Slocum: (35:57):

We go. I know, I know. Um, a pat like this from inspect point, but, um, you know, when we were at rpi Yes. We beat you guys, I think. Yes. Uh, four years in a row while I was there. Something like

Luke Connery: (36:10):

That. Was that four years in a row? . We didn't win one of those.

Drew Slocum: (36:15):

Um, who is the better engineering school? WPI or rpi? I know, I know what you're gonna

Luke Connery: (36:21):

Say. Is this a, is this a loaded question, drew? I mean, I'm trying to be, uh, you know, polite to the host here, but, you know, take a look at, uh, I'm pretty sure I could pull some rankings, uh, that put WPI at the top of the list. But

Drew Slocum: (36:36):

Look, R RPI is not in the top of my list right now. So you can say

Luke Connery: (36:39):

Wpi. Hey, you know what, let me just say this. I'm sure we could find very talented, successful people from both schools. How about that? Is that

Drew Slocum: (36:46):

Fair? Good. Good candy answer.

Luke Connery: (36:48):

Yeah. ,

Drew Slocum: (36:51):

Um, you were saying this earlier. So what do you, I know you were involved in all the different processes of, of selling to different channels mm-hmm. , what is, what is the, this is not a quick response round, but what's it, what do you like best and what do you think is easier? Contractor engineer, hj? Hmm.

Luke Connery: (37:19):

Well, if I start, start with the engineers, I think you find the crowd of people who are most interested in staying on top of what's happening from an innovation standpoint. And, you know, this is on average because there's gonna be contractors that just heard that and are angry with me over the podcast ways. Yeah. No,

Drew Slocum: (37:40):

It's

Luke Connery: (37:40):

All right. Um, um, because I do think that there are contractors. I mean, I met one this morning for the first time who, uh, very sort of forward thinking Sure. They wanna do the right thing, you know? Yeah. And authorities having jurisdiction. I mean, the thing about AHJs is there's so few of them, and they tend to, you know, if you're working for a municipality for example, you, you, you know, there's no room to escape. Like you've got the city of Cambridge, or you've got the city of Boston, right. And everything that's happening there in your bailiwick, right? Yeah. And you, there's so many aspects to those buildings that you've gotta be knowledgeable.

Drew Slocum: (38:18):

So you got this little H V A C

Luke Connery: (38:20):

Little, you know, so, yeah. So, so, you know, in terms of, you know, who's got the hardest job? I would say definitely the AHJs for sure. Um, you know, the engineers tend to sort of pull you in and they want to embrace you, and they wanna learn more about it. I would say, uh, cuz they generally want to do the right thing and, and create the safest buildings for people. And then, you know, the, you know, the contractors, you know, the, the, the, the, the best thing about I think the contracting conversations is the timelines. Again, we're not talking two years, three years, four years. We're talking about, you know, this week, this month Yep. This project, next project. Mm-hmm. . And, um, so if you're somebody that enjoys sort of the rapid turn of events, the contracting conversation, so listen, I, I wear all hats. I have to, uh, and I've had experiences at all levels and with, you know, all these different sort of layers of the cake, so to speak. Right? Yeah. And, uh, I enjoy all of it.

Drew Slocum: (39:13):

Yeah, that's good. Yeah. Um, what did you enjoy more? The T-Rex nozzle or the aesthetic sidewall?

Luke Connery: (39:26):

The old,

Drew Slocum: (39:26):

So I, I, I remember T-Rex Nozzle from our Tyco days, so Yeah. Yeah. They didn't call it that, you know, that Well,

Luke Connery: (39:32):

They, they couldn't call it that because it was, um, what, what was it? Once upon a time, so we had a

Drew Slocum: (39:38):

For explain the T-Rex now.

Luke Connery: (39:40):

Okay. All right. So, so, um, once upon a time there was a tunnel and they were looking to put a certain density of, uh, spray into that tunnel.

Drew Slocum: (39:48):

Tunnel. Speaking of tunnel, yeah. Episode four, the fire protection podcast with Mr. Workman. With Mr. Workman.

Luke Connery: (39:55):

Yeah. That was great. That was great. It really was. Um, so sim similar to probably some of Martin's experiences. Um, you know, basically over in, um, uh, I think it was Norway, definitely one of the Nordic countries, they had done some work and basically they took the Tyco s SW 20 or 24 sprinkler removed the bulb and said, yep, this is the spray performance we're looking for. We just need it bigger so we could have less. Yeah. You know, the orifice could be bigger so we could have lesser or lower pressures. And so what happened was they, that engineer, um, literally took the s sw 20 or 24, put it on the photocopier, pressed the scale up button a bunch of times, , and then reversed engineered, right? Oh wow. This nozzle. And it was a monstrosity. Okay. Okay. And it was a, a terrible performer in terms of spray performance. And so that was the T-Rex nozzle, right. And that's when they came back to Tyco, and now that's Johnson Controls. And they said, Hey, can you guys help us to develop, uh, purpose built nozzle that does what we want it to do? Sure. And that set the stage for what is now known as the tn TN 25 nozzle.

Drew Slocum: (41:09):

One of the TX is a great name,

Luke Connery: (41:11):

Tn, you know, tunnel nozzle, K factor 25. I mean, come on,

Drew Slocum: (41:16):

You know, Raven, everybody's raving about Raven. That was great. So

Luke Connery: (41:20):

The Raven Studio was, that's the aesthetic side wall. So that was a fun project because it was the sort of the first, you know, paint and place, um, uh, sprinkler. Um, you know, that was so, so again, I can't pick favorites between the two. They were both enjoyable projects. Yeah. , one of 'em had bigger fires. So I will say that Okay, the tunnel fires are bigger and that's always more fun. Those are always fun. So,

Drew Slocum: (41:45):

Um, last question here. Uh, so this is, we're gonna be doing, you'll be at N FPA a and so Will in Spec Point

Luke Connery: (41:53):

San Antonio. Yep.

Drew Slocum: (41:54):

Yep. So that should be fun. Um, great town as well. But we're, I'm, I'm gonna try, try to do a live podcast on, on sprinkler, but dry pipe systems specifically. Mm. Uh, getting somebody from an air compressor company, somebody from a nitrogen company, somebody from an engineer, somebody from a, a contractor's point of view. And then myself, we're gonna, we're gonna duke it out in a room round

Luke Connery: (42:20):

Table. Yeah, that's a, that's a cool

Drew Slocum: (42:22):

Idea. Cause you only get, you know, the podcast and, and certain other presentations you only get sometimes one viewpoint. Mm-hmm. . So let's, let's duke it out. What is your, uh, experience in dry pipe systems? I know you got, you're heavily in sprinkler. Yeah. What is your opinion of the whole nitrogen wave, I guess?

Luke Connery: (42:43):

Yeah. This is from a, uh, a corrosion resistant Yeah, yeah. Standpoint. I mean, to be honest with you, um, I'm not up to speed on the latest with these nitrogen systems, and I think they were being used for a couple different things. Yeah.

Drew Slocum: (42:56):

They're, yeah,

Luke Connery: (42:57):

They're pretty cool. Um, you know, I think, I think innovation is important in every industry. Mm-hmm. , because I think without innovation, you industries die. Yeah. And I think that, um, while we are a heavily sort of regulated industry, and I think that, um, you know, uh, there, there are a lot of, a lot of momentum. There's a lot of forces, externalities sort of holding back from doing sort of radically different approaches on technologies. I think it's important. I think, I think our industry and, and, uh, is, is is, uh, slowly but surely, you know, evolving mm-hmm. , uh, in some parts, you know, faster than in other parts. And I think suppression and the related systems that go into these suppression systems, uh, is right there with it. Right. And I think there, there's an acceleration that's happening right now. Oh, yeah. You know, where I think things are finally, you know, when you look at, look at what we've done with cell phones in the same period of time.

(44:01)
Yeah. Where, you know, we, we've all been around suppression systems for 20 years or so. Right, right. Right. I mean, look back 20 years when cell phones, like, you know, I think they start, started to first exist about 20 years ago. 20 years ago, maybe 25 years ago. Right. Well, you know, and then look at the sprinkler systems and the extinguishers. I mean, there, there's some, so, so I think it's important. Um, so I know I'm not commenting directly on nitrogen as it pertains to dry pipe systems, but, um, I'm glad to see that there's some new technologies

Drew Slocum: (44:27):

No, I do, I do

Luke Connery: (44:28):

Too. That are coming into the fold.

Drew Slocum: (44:29):

Yeah. You gotta, you kind gotta mix it up. And tech, and same thing with, you know, the mobile technologies iot stuff coming out. It's, something's gotta change.

Luke Connery: (44:40):

I mean, in spec point, I mean, what a tremendous, uh, platform as, um, you know, particularly for, you know, the road ahead where everything's becoming

Drew Slocum: (44:48):

Smart Yeah.

Luke Connery: (44:50):

Including suppression systems. Right. And probably on the passive side as well.

Drew Slocum: (44:54):

Sure. H V Cs are already smart

Luke Connery: (44:56):

And every, if everything Yeah, that's a good point. All these, these building systems connection. Yeah. It, and it's getting, I mean, they're, they all touch Yeah. At some point. Yeah. And it's just a matter of time until they become a part of the big, uh, you know, one big picture. Right. And, um, a platform like inspect point, uh, with the ability to sort of tie it all together mm-hmm. and, um, you know, you know, with the primary charge being, Hey, let's make sure these systems work the way they were designed. Right. Because the smarter the system, the more complex the system. Correct. And the more failure points. Yeah. Probably. Yeah. And so, you know, I think proactive, you know, inspection of maintenance is, is critical.

Drew Slocum: (45:33):

Yeah. No, that, that's, we'll get into it in n FPA about the dry pipe. It is gonna be fun. I, I'll, I'll get some boxing gloves out. Yeah.

Luke Connery: (45:42):

Well, I'll, I'll try to find you guys and, and see what I can do to distract you while you're trying to record your podcast. That's fine. It's gonna be good to sort of catch up with everybody.

Drew Slocum: (45:50):

No, it'll be good. Yeah. It's, uh, it's exciting. Well, um, yeah, that's, that's all I got. You did. You did well. So, uh, on the quick response round, ,

Luke Connery: (46:00):

Appreciate it.

Drew Slocum: (46:01):

But, uh, thanks again, uh, for joining. Thank you. Where can people find you? Find, uh, conquest Flame Bar, you know. Yeah.

Luke Connery: (46:11):

Social Media channel. So channel, so if you take a, you know, a quick Google search, conquest fire spray.com, um, you know, uh, email. I could be reached at l connery@conquestfirespray.com. Can I give a phone number out on a podcast? Is that not smart? I don't, I don't. It's on my LinkedIn. You can find me on LinkedIn. On LinkedIn, Luke Connery, and, uh, my phone number is (508) 884-6959. I don't care. Give a call. I'm always willing to chat.

Drew Slocum: (46:43):

Uh, thanks again. This is, this is fun. We'll, uh, I guess we'll see each other at N F P A and

Luke Connery: (46:48):

Have a drink or two. Yeah man, we'll see you in a couple of weeks. Yeah. Thanks Drew.

Drew Slocum: (46:52):

See ya.

Drew Slocum: (46:53):

Thanks for tuning in to episode 7 of the Fire Protection Podcast, powered by Inspect Point. Want to again, thank Luke Connery for joining me on today's podcast to give a different direction of fire protection from the H V A C side of things and Fire re ducting upcoming here in a few weeks. Uh, in Spec Point and the Fire Protection Podcast, we're gonna be live at N F P A out in San Antonio, Texas from June 17th through the 19th. So please stop by our booth. We'll have some inspect point, uh, swag to give away, as well as we will be doing a live podcast out there as well. So, um, stop on out if you are in the, uh, Texas San Antonio area, and make sure to subscribe.