Firefly® Phoenix Continues To Protect Home Bargains Chain

As value for money makes the Home Bargains brand an increasingly popular choice with price conscious shoppers, the national retailer is continuing to increase its coverage by building new stores in locations such as Camborne in Cornwall, with products from the FIREFLY® range repeatedly being included in the specification to help ensure the safety of staff and customers.  As with many of its outlets, the existing 9,150sq ft warehouse and sales floor on the Camborne Retail Park is being refurbished by Oakhurst (Southport) Ltd. with WPL Consulting filling the role of project architect. 

The Phoenix Vertical, Collaroll and ancillary FIREFLY® products have been used to create a semi-permanent fire barrier that is suspended from the underside of the pitched, metal decked roof. Installation of the 60- minute rated fire curtain and smoke barrier was carried out by sub-contractor S R Shopfitting over a period of just a couple of days in early July, with the new Home Bargains outlet scheduled for its official opening on August 22nd. Working from hydraulic platforms, the lightweight Phoenix fire barrier was fixed to sections of steel angle bolted onto the roof members, with all overlaps sealed using FIREFLY® High Temperature Adhesive, while butt joints were fixed using stainless steel staples. 

While the Collaroll was used to wrap the high-level steel beams, the manufacturer’s ablative batts – introduced into the range last year to assist with tasks like creating protected zones – fill voids beneath the soffit level. The Site Manager for Oakhurst, Kerry Humphrey’s, commented: “Along with a number of S R Shopfitting’s operatives, I have been on the FIREFLY® training course at its Rochdale premises and consider the systems to be far easier to install than the previous solution, which involved installing quite bulky sections of rock mineral wool which, even for those not directly involved with the work, tended to make you itch quite badly.  The Phoenix and other products, by contrast are light to handle and easy to fix.  It’s a brilliant system.”

“In respect of the Home Bargains stores we’ve been involved on, the fire requirements vary slightly between England and Scotland, where the regulation is for a full fire and smoke barrier and we know FIREFLY® will provide any special details we need for new jobs.  With the barrier now installed by SR Shopfitting, the internal construction will continue so that the Phoenix terminates on top of the ceiling structure.  Everything is going well and we are on schedule to handover the building on the 21st.” 

Manufactured from woven and non-woven glass, the FIREFLY® range is designed to optimise resistance to flame and smoke as well as offer heat protection in a wide range of scenarios. The barriers are easy to install horizontally or vertically using a full selection of FIREFLY® ancillary products to ensure a fully tested and certified installed system.  www.tbafirefly.com