World-famous Lewis chessmen protected from fire by Notifier by Honeywell
Lewes, East Sussex, 5th August 2015: Notifier by Honeywell technology has been installed to protect some of the UK’s greatest treasures – the Lewis chessmen.
Six of the walrus ivory chess pieces dating from the 12thcentury are to be housed in a newly-created museum at Lews Castle on the island of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides.
Highly-sensitive Notifier by Honeywell technology has been used to protect the distinctive chessmen, which are to be on loan from The British Museum in London. The pieces were found in the early 1830s as part of a set of 93 which is divided between the British Museum and the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh.
Besides accommodating the chessmen, the new museum at Lews Castle will also house some of the island’s most important archives in a multi-million pound project that includes the creation of a boutique hotel within the restored 19thcentury structure.
To give early warning of any fire incident, the new archive area in the museum has been protected by a high-specification, air monitoring FAAST aspirating unit.
For aesthetic reasons, two FAAST aspirating units have also been installed to monitor fire safety in most of the hotel finished so far, including the beautiful, ornamented ballroom, new bar area and ground floor bedrooms. The aspirating units installed use hard-to-spot discreet capillaries to check for fire threats.
Elsewhere in the hotel, which will be completed in a third and final phase, optical smoke detectors have been deployed.
Both the hotel and museum are currently networked to two Notifier by Honeywell Pearl control panels, with provision for the respective sites to be operated separately in the future. A Notifier Emergency Voice Communication System has also been installed in the hotel over two levels.
Optical smoke devices protect the public and office areas of the museum, while in the kitchen and plant room, SMART2multi-criteria smoke and heat detection has been deployed.
The museum has been largely completed, but is not yet open to the public, while the hotel is expected to be ready before the end of the year.
The installation was carried out by Crane Communications of Belfast, which has previously undertaken work on schools in the Hebrides.
“It is a beautiful site and a fascinating project to work on,” said Ken Burns, Crane Communications director. “The challenge was to install working fire protection that could easily become two separate systems without upheaval. Pearl panels gave us the ease of use and tremendous flexibility we needed.”
“The huge adaptability of Notifier fire systems has made them ideal for this fascinating project,” said Richard Paine, Product Marketing Manager, Notifier by Honeywell. “Installing Pearl panels and aspirating detection in this museum and hotel complex has not only accommodated the demands of a hugely-sensitive site very easily, but has given everyone confidence they will meet whatever challenge they face as the site develops.”
