EXPERIMENT NO: _____

CASE STUDY ON SENSORS USED IN FIRE ALARMS

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 INTRODUCTION
Fire alarms are prime necessities in modern buildings and architectures, especially in
banks, data centers and gas stations. They detects the fire in ambiance at very early stage
by sensing smoke or/and heat and raise an alarm which warns people about the fire and
furnish sufficient time to take preventive measures. It not only prevents a big losses
caused by deadly fire but sometimes proves to be life savers.

An automatic fire alarm system is designed to detect the unwanted presence of fire by
monitoring environmental changes associated with combustion. In general, a fire alarm
system is either classified as automatic, manually activated , or both. Automatic fire
alarm system can be used to notify people to evacuate in the event of a fire or other
emergency , to summon emergency services, and to prepare the structure associated
systems to control the speed of fire and smoke.

Fire alarm systems have become increasingly sophisticated and functionality more
capable and reliable in recent years. They are designed to fulfill two general
requirements: protection of property and assets and protection of life. As a result of state
and local codes, the life-safety aspect of fire protection has become a major factor in last
two decades. There are number of reasons for the substantial increase in the life-safety
form of fire protection during recent years, foremost of which are:

1. The proliferation of high rise construction and the concern for life safety within
these buildings.
2. A growing awareness of life safety hazards in residential , institutional and
educational occupancies.
3. Increased hazards caused by new building materials and furnishing that creates
large amount of toxic combustion products.
4. Vast improvements in smoke detection and related technology made possible
through quantum advances in electronic technology.
 SENSORS USED IN FIRE ALARM SYSTEM
AIM: To study different types of sensors used in fire alarm system.

APPARATUS: 1. HEAT ALARM SYSTEM:

1 x 10 K Thermistor sensor
1 x LM358 Operational Amplifier (Op Amp)
1 x 4.7 K Resistor (1/4 Watt)
1 x 10 K Potentiometer
1 x Small Buzzer (5V Buzzer)
Connecting Wires
Mini Breadboard
5V Power Supply

2. SMOKE ALARM SYSTEM:

MQ-2 Sensor
LM358
10K
330
LED
0.1F
10K POT

THEORY : A fire alarm system has a number of devices working together to

detect and warn people through visual and audio appliances when smoke , fire, carbon
monoxide or other emergencies are present. These alarms may be activated
automatically from smoke detectors and heat detectors or may also be activated via
manual fire alarm activation devices such as manual call point or pull station. Alarms
can be either motorized bells or wall mount table sounders or horns. They can also be
speaker strobs with sound an alarm, followed by a voice evacuation message which
wants people inside the building not to use the elevators. Fire alarm sounders can be set
to certain frequencies and different tones including low, medium and high, depending on
the country and manufacturer of the device.
Sensor used in : 1. Heat Alarm:

THERMISTOR: 10K Thermistor

Thermistors are temperature dependent resistors i.e. the resistance of a Thermistor varies
according to the ambient temperature. There are two types of Thermistors: PTC
Thermistor and NTC Thermistor. PTC stands for Positive Temperature Coefficient and
NTC stands for Negative Temperature Coefficient. In PTC Thermistor, the resistance is
directly proportional to the temperature and in NTC Thermistor, the resistance is
inversely proportional to the temperature.
 2. Smoke Alarm:

MQ-2

The MQ-2 is a flammable gas and smoke sensor detects the concentrations of
combustible gas in the air and outputs its reading as an analog voltage.The sensor can
measure concentrations of flammable gas of 300 to 10,000 ppm.The MQ-2 gas sensor is
sensitive to LPG, i-butane, propane, methane, alcohol, Hydrogen and smoke.They are
used in gas leakage detecting equipments in family and industry and in portable gas
detector.

WORKING

1. HEAT ALARM:

We will now see the working of the simple Fire Alarm Circuit. First thing to know is
that the main component in detecting the fire is the 10 K Thermistor. As we mentioned
in the component description, the 10 K Thermistor used here is a NTC type Thermistor.
If the temperature increases, the resistance of the Thermistor decreases.
In case of fire, the temperature increases. This increase in temperature will reduce the
resistance of the 10 K Thermistor. As the resistance decreases, the output of the voltage
divider will increase. Since the output of the voltage divider is given to the non
inverting input of the LM358 Op Amp, its value will become more than that of the
inverting input. As a result, the output of the Op Amp becomes high and it activates
the buzzer.

Circuit Working
The circuit consists of a 10k ohm thermistor. This is an NTC thermistor, which
decreases its resistance with increase in the temperature.
At room temperature it had a resistance of 10kohms.
Another resistance is connected to the thermistor to form voltage divider circuit
and this is connected to the transistor through a diode.

Buzzer switches on only when the transistor is grounded. As the temperature increase
the buzzer sound also increases
 2. SMOKE DETECTOR:

LM358 acts as a comparator in this circuit. The inverting terminal of LM358 is

connected to POT so that the sensitivity of the circuit can be adjusted.

The output of LM358 is given to an LED as an indicator although a buzzer can be used
as an alarm. The non-inverting terminal of LM358 is connected with output of smoke
sensor.

Initially, when the air is clean, the conductivity between the electrodes is less, as the
resistance is in the order of 50K. The inverting terminal input of comparator is higher
than the non-inverting terminal input. The indicator LED is OFF.

In the event of fire, when the sensor is filled with smoke, the resistance of the sensor
falls to 5K and the conductivity between the electrodes increases.

This provides a higher input at the non-inverting terminal of comparator than the
inverting terminal and the output of comparator is high. The alarming LED is turned ON
as an indication of presence of smoke.
APPLICATIONS:

Fire Alarm Circuits are very useful in homes, offices, schools, labs, etc. to detect
and prevent any disasters due to fire.
Fire Alarm Systems can work as a stand alone devices or be a part of a complex
home security system with other security features like smoke detection, intruder
alert, motion detection, etc.

CONCLUSION: A fire alarm is a device that detects the presence of fire and
atmospheric changes relating to smoke. In some cases, a fire alarm is a part of a
complete security system, in addition to a burglary protection system. The fire alarm
operates to alert people to evacuate a location in which a fire or smoke accumulation is
present. When functioning properly, a fire alarm will sound to notify people of an
immediate fire emergency. Fire alarms can be found in homes, schools, churches and
businesses and function as the catalyst to saving lives. For most fire alarms, when
sounded, a beep, bell or horn noise is made. This distinct sound exists to allow the
notification to be heard. The fire alarm constructed by this project work us reliable at
low cost.