A nationwide roof top unit manufacturer has made a change to how they ship their roof top equipment. When equipped with an economizer (think fresh air intake), they are not factory installing the duct-type smoke detector, but they are factory installing the air sampling tube. The duct detector is installed on a bracket in a “shipping” position. Their product data indicates that the duct-type smoke detector must be relocated into the final location, connected to the air sampling tube, and wired to the fire alarm system.
We have recently seen this twice on our projects where the mechanical contractor, electrical contractor, and fire alarm contractor did not recognize that the “shipping” position was not the final position and the device was wired the unit in the wrong location. This misunderstanding resulted in a substantial delay during final fire alarm acceptance testing while all the detectors were relocated and rewired.
You can see below in the first picture (on the left) that the duct detector is wired in the shipping position and the corrected installation in the second picture (on the right).
Anybody else seeing this in the field?