Rule ID: SUK/1003/v2.0
Important
Changes and improvements to the Fire Stopping rules may have an impact on any existing results, please take the time to review to the changes. See Update Log for BIM Coordination + Extension.
This article describes the Fire Stopping General Distance Rule that has been developed by Solibri UK Ltd as part of the BIM Coordination + Library.
The rule is available for Solibri Office 9.13.7 or later via a Solibri Extension, which can be downloaded from the Solibri Solution Center.
The article covers the following topics:
Related articles:
Important
The parameters in this rule must be defined by the user to give meaningful results.
Important
This rule requires connection to an external spreadsheet and the Service Distance sheet and where necessary the Service Types sheet. A copy of this default template for all Fire Stopping rules FireStoppingRequirements.xlsx can be downloaded at the end of the Introduction article or through the link in the description (info view), for the selected rule in the checking view.
This rule is used to check generic distances between classified services running through compartmentation walls and floors. The service type of the penetrations determines their minimum/maximum distance requirements along with whether the services are of the same or different type.
This rule checks the distances between service penetrations based on their service type.
The rule first checks to ensure all components filtered as services are classified by the Service Classification, returning a low severity result of all unclassified components. The rule then finds all penetrations of service components with walls and slabs through their corresponding filters, ignoring any partial penetrations where the service does not run completely through the wall or floor.
Important
The Service Distance sheet within a .xlsx spreadsheet defines the minimum and maximum distance requirements between service penetrations based on whether they are of the same service classification or differ. The service penetrations within the same compartmentation have their geometry checked such that any pair closer than the minimum distance or further than the maximum distance return moderate results. Any service penetrations with a service classification that are unspecified within the requirements file are also returned as moderate results to ensure that they are addressed.
Service Types Sheet
Penetrations that contain only one classified service require no further configuration before checking. Where a penetrating service is made up of multiple classified service components which are not classified using the same classification name, for example, ducts that support fire/smoke dampers, these need to be merged to act as one service using the Services Types Sheet as shown below. Failing to do this will automatically create a partial penetration of the service through the compartmentation, thus ignoring them. The Main Service Type can then be used to define the distance requirements in the Service Distance Sheet.
Example of merging Ducts with a Damper
Specify the classified service for the the Main Service Type and then in the Mergeable Service Types column specify the classified services that will be merged. Multiple mergeable services can be listed using semi colons as a delimiter between values. A Merge Gap Tolerance value in mm can be added to bridge any component modelling gaps or ignored using 0 for the value. Then simply specify using an x in the column to which rules this configuration needs to apply to. This sheet also supports the use of wildcards.
Results where services are merged will report the Service Type as Main Service Type : Mergeable Service Type as indicated in the results image below.
In the Parameters View, you can define the compartmentation, services, and requirements file location containing the service distance requirements. Alternatively use a predefined Common Parameter Name configuration to consistently utilise the same values for parameters within multiple fire stopping rules, essentially configuring the values only once.
Important
The Services and Fire Seals filter of these rules requires users to set up classifications. It is also good practice to use classifications for the Compartmentation filter, for the following reasons:
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Help structure model geometry allowing easy identification and visualization in the classification providing a clear indication of what will be checked.
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Where present Services and Fire Penetration Seals will require classification values to interact with the FireStoppingRequirements.xlsx.
Tip
The screenshots shown here have been taken from the FireStoppingRequirement_EXAMPLE.xlsx spreadsheet which is available for download from the end of the Introduction article.
Rule parameters indicating a more generic service inclusion
Important
Please ensure that all elements are classified, or you have restricted the filter in the Settings tab of the Classification to limit the components to be classified.
Tip
The Services Filter in this instance is using the operator Is Defined to filter all classified services. This negates having to use the One of operator, ensuring that you have all service values selected. Updates to the classification are also applied automatically.
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Common Parameters Name: The dropdown list displays the available pre-configured Common Parameter Names. Selecting a pre-configured value from the list automatically hides any common parameters and utilises the definitions in the named common parameter setup. Each filter or parameter controlled by the Common Parameter Name set up can be overridden if required using the override buttons and then configured manually within the rule. For common Parameter Name values see configuring the Common Parameter Rule.
Rule Parameters using Common Parameter Name
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Walls filter: The parameter table defines the compartmentation walls that will be checked. This rule only checks the distance between services that run through these filtered compartmentation components.
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Floors filter: The parameter table defines the compartmentation floors that will be checked. This rule only checks the distance between services that run through these filtered compartmentation components.
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Services (will exclude Fire seals) filter: The parameter table defines the service components that will have their service penetration distances checked.
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Service Classification: Select the classification that contains the classified services that are defined in the services filter. The Service Types Column on the Service Distance sheet in the Requirements spreadsheet file references the classifications names from this Services Classification to define their requirements.
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Requirements File Path: Browse and select the requirements spreadsheet file (xlsx) that contains both the Service Types (if mergeable services are used) and the Service Distance sheets used to define the dimensional requirements of the distance check between services.
Service Distance sheet parameters
Example Service Distance tab within Requirements spreadsheet defining associated values from classified components
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Service Types (separated by semicolons, can contain wildcards) [Column A]: This cell contains the name(s) to match from the Services Classification for its distance requirements and category specified in that row. If multiple names are listed, those service type names must be separated by semicolons (;). The use of the Asterisks (*) and Question Mark (?) and double hyphen (--) wildcards characters can be used to match names such that:
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* Matches 0 or more characters e.g. Duct*
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? Matches exactly 1 character
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-- Matches anything except characters after the double dashes
Tip
Classify your services to the level of granularity that you require in the Service Distance tab. This could be as granular as individual service sizes (for example Copper Pipes 22mm, Copper Pipes 15mm), or could be grouped (for example all plastic pipes less than 150mm). Utilising a different classification so that early checks do not require the same level of granularity required in other Fire Stopping rules will provide flexibility. The services example above is defined to give an indication of how the rule functions.
Each rule that references the Requirements spreadsheet file(such as FireStoppingRequirements.xlsx) may reference singular or multiple tabs. As such, you can separate these workbooks to provide greater flexibility.
To ensure that there are no errors (typos) you can create a list of values from the Classification Settings page by exporting it to Excel as long as all values are present.
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Distance with same Service Type (empty for unbounded) Minimum (mm): This cell contains the minimum distance in millimetres that the specified service type penetrations must be from one another when they are of the same service type. If left blank the rule automatically sets this to infinity.
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Distance with same Service Type (empty for unbounded) Maximum (mm): This cell contains the maximum distance in millimetres that the specified service penetrations must be from one another when they are of the same service type. If left blank the rule automatically sets this to infinity.
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Distance with different Service Types (empty for unbounded) Minimum (mm): This cell contains the minimum distance in millimetres that the service penetrations must be from one another when they are different service types. If left blank the rule automatically sets this to infinity.
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Distance with different Service Types (empty for unbounded) Maximum (mm): This cell contains the maximum distance in millimetres that the service penetrations must be from one another when they are different service types. If left blank the rule automatically sets this to infinity.
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Issue Category (empty for default): This cell contains the category name to group the specified service type listing in the results view. If unspecified, those results are grouped by a category named “Results”.
Pipes failing the minimum distance requirement
The Info View shows the description of the requirements and why it has failed. Infinity symbols are used where no values are specified. This data provides good quality information for any issue description which is automatically captured.
The rule Results are arranged into three categories:
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User-defined category names for unsatisfied distance requirements
You can create your own category names for the list of results of unsatisfied distance requirements based on the service type specified. This can be done in the Issue Category cell of the Service Distance Sheet tab inside the requirements file spreadsheet (.xlsx). Alternatively, you can leave them unspecified to be grouped by the default “Results” category.
In the example below, Critical (
) severity results are listed for the pair of services with unsatisfied distance requirements. The information listed includes the names of their service types and the required and actual distances...
Issue Category mimics the value contained in the Issue Category field of the Service Distance tab.
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Unspecified service distance between Requirement
This category lists Moderate (
) severity results for services that have penetrations and are classified by the Services Classification that was to be checked but do not have a listing in the requirements file spreadsheet (.xlsx) for their distance requirements. The results include the names of the service classifications for the pair of service penetrations as shown in the example below...
Missing Pipe requirements
Results outcome for unspecified service distance between requirements
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Unclassified Services
This category has a single Low (
Unclassified service issues
Selecting all components from the building services model shows missing objects that are not classified. In this case, both Air Terminal objects and Fire Penetration Seals should not be checked anyway
Severity Parameters
In addition, you can specify the severity classes according to your preferences and priorities in the Severity Parameters dialog. For example, you can filter specific compartmentation or services penetration components to have critical or low severity results.