18/4 Shielded Fire Alarm Cable - FPLP Plenum Rated, Red, Data, 1000ft

In an office, school, hospital, or store, the space above the drop ceiling is usually a return-air plenum, and any fire alarm cable that runs through it without conduit has to be plenum rated. This is the four-conductor shielded fire alarm cable for those buildings: four 18 AWG solid bare copper conductors, insulated black, red, brown, and blue in low-smoke PVC, wrapped in an aluminum-Mylar foil shield with a drain wire, under a red low-smoke PVC jacket listed FPLP under NEC Article 760 for power-limited fire alarm circuits in plenums, drop ceilings, and raised floors. It's a data-grade cable, with insulation built to the tighter electrical tolerances that addressable panels specify for their signaling line circuits, so it's approved for SLC loops as well as notification and initiating circuits. Four conductors means two circuits in one pull: the power pair and the alarm pair for four-wire smoke detectors, a signaling line circuit and an initiating circuit to the same device box, or a relay module's control and monitor pairs, on the 18 AWG gauge most panel manufacturers specify for SLC and initiating circuits. The foil shield and drain wire keep induced noise out of circuits that have to share a ceiling space with lighting ballasts, VFDs, and HVAC motors.

FPLP is the top of the fire alarm cable hierarchy: it can go anywhere FPLR or FPL can, plus the air-handling spaces they can't. The red jacket is the fire alarm identification that inspectors and future technicians expect to see. The cable is ETL Listed, RoHS compliant, and made in the USA, and it comes in a 1000 ft pull box with sequential footage marks on the jacket.

Features

• FPLP plenum rated. Listed under NEC Article 760 for power-limited fire alarm circuits in return-air plenums, drop ceilings, and raised floors without conduit, and for every riser and general-purpose run below that.
• Four 18 AWG solid bare copper conductors. Two circuits in one cable, on the standard gauge for signaling line and initiating circuits, for four-wire detectors, combined SLC and initiating runs, and control modules.
• Aluminum-Mylar foil shield with drain wire. 100% coverage against induced noise from ballasts, VFDs, and HVAC equipment sharing the ceiling space, with a 24 AWG drain wire for a clean bond at the panel.
• Data grade. Insulation held to the electrical tolerances addressable panels call for on a signaling line circuit.
• Low-smoke PVC insulation, black, red, brown, and blue. Four distinct colors so each pair keeps its polarity and identity from the panel to the device, with a 0.010 in wall.
• Red low-smoke PVC jacket. Low smoke for the plenum listing, in the standard fire alarm color, so the cable is recognizable in a ceiling space or a junction box years after it's installed.
• 300 V, 75 °C. The ratings a power-limited fire alarm circuit calls for.
• 4.32 mm outer diameter. A 0.015 in jacket wall over the shield, sized to fit standard fire alarm fittings and connectors.
• ETL Listed, RoHS compliant, made in the USA. Also carries the Canadian FT6 plenum flame rating.
• 1000 ft pull box. Sequential footage marks on the jacket; pays out from the box without a spool stand, and the box stacks in a van.

Where It Fits

It suits four-wire smoke and heat detector circuits that need a separate power pair alongside the alarm pair, device runs that carry both a signaling line circuit and an initiating or power circuit to the same location, relay and control modules with a control pair and a monitor pair, duct detector and damper control wiring, runs through the plenum ceiling of an office, hotel, hospital, school, or retail floor, circuits that share a ceiling space with lighting ballasts, VFDs, and HVAC equipment, and any power-limited fire alarm run where two 18 AWG pairs in one pull save a second cable.

Good to Know

Don't put both legs of a Class A loop in the same cable. NFPA 72 requires the outgoing and return conductors of a Class A circuit to be routed separately so that one fault can't take out both, and a four-conductor cable running out and back defeats that; use it for two different circuits, or for the power and alarm pairs of a four-wire device. Run the voltage-drop calculation before you put 18 AWG on a notification circuit or a detector power pair: an 18 AWG pair is about 13 ohms per 1000 ft round trip, so a circuit drawing 1 A at the far end of a 300 ft run loses about 3.9 V, which is right at the limit most 24 V panels allow; for a loaded notification circuit, step up to the 16/4 or 14/4. On an SLC or initiating circuit the current is tiny and the gauge is fine for the panel's full rated loop length. Ground the shield's drain wire at the panel end only and tape it back at the device end; a shield grounded at both ends becomes a loop that picks up the noise it was meant to reject. The data-grade insulation is built for SLC loops, but the foil shield still adds capacitance, which some addressable panels count against loop length, so check the panel's SLC wiring guide for its shielded-cable limit. Plenum-rated cable is for the air-handling space, not for inside the ductwork itself, which the NEC doesn't allow for any fire alarm cable. If the ceiling isn't a plenum, the riser-rated 18/4 does the same job for less. The cable is listed for fire alarm circuits under Article 760, and the AHJ has the final say on using it for anything else. Keep fire alarm cable separate from power conductors in raceways and boxes, as the code requires for power-limited circuits. Plenum compounds are stiffer than ordinary PVC and four solid conductors under one jacket stiffen it further, so give it a generous bend radius and size the backboxes for it. The jacket isn't UV stabilized or rated for wet locations or burial, so an outdoor device should be fed through conduit or from a cable rated for it.

Specifications

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