With today’s continually advancing building engineering technology, design professionals are presented with a multitude of options for HVAC design. With such variety comes the burden of comprehending all of the design coordination and code compliance implications — in particular, when it comes to proper fire and smoke damper design. Many of the unique design elements in today’s building design require the mechanical engineer/designer to be familiar with many more options for proper code compliance of fire/smoke damper design and coordination than ever before.
There are many design parameters when it comes to understanding the full complexity of fire and smoke damper design and installation. This article will attempt to cover a few of these complexities. The information presented will assume the reader is already familiar with the basic concepts, terminology, and code requirements for fire/smoke damper design and installation. The goal is to present some design options that are atypical of common fire/smoke damper design, and also to provide the reader some of the damper design pitfalls to avoid or understand further. We’ll explore the following questions.