19 March 2017
Six Institute of Technical Education (ITE) students have designed an electrically operated fire-suppression system built from off-the-shelf parts.
Mr Oscar Pong, Mr Stanley Ng, Mr Muhammad Irsyad Amin S., Mr Willy Tho, Mr Dominic Yeo and Mr Tan Yi Ying, from ITE College West’s technical engineer diploma (TED) in automotive engineering, designed this for their graduation project.
Mr Ng, the team spokesman, said that cases of vehicle fires have been increasing, with older vehicles exhibiting more problems. To address the need for fire suppression, his team installed a household smoke detector in their test vehicle’s engine bay. Upon detecting smoke or heat, it would beep a warning, allowing the driver to respond by flicking a switch. Activating the switch would trigger a dry-powder fire extinguisher, releasing its contents through strategically placed nozzles on the engine.