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[size4riggerboots]

I think it's now safe to say that you lot have meandered off topic.

[Lewis]

You say that like it's a bad thing

[Randomist]

CO2 extinguishers are generally not recharged on board.

Right! The whole thing is a sealed unit and has to be sent ashore. You have to have very specialised equipment on board to do this and I've never sailed with or heard of any one sailing with it.

[dawg]

CO2 extinguishers are generally not recharged on board.

What's that info based on? They're generally recharged on board ours...

[Chiefy]

Are you sure?
You carry bulk liquid CO2 and dispense it into smaller portable CO2 extinguishers and charge bottles for portable foam engines and dry powder extinguishers?

I stand to be corrected but never heard of this being the case, even HP CO2 systems the bottles are recharged shore side in LP systems the CO2 comes in road tankers to refill the bottles after use or dry docking.

[ETwhat?]

and as a random aside since i started this none of ours are recharged on board we do have spare charges just incase but the routine service/inspection is contract

[Randomist]

The only possible CO2 replenishment I can think of on our ships is changing bottles for the drenching systems in galley/engine spaces or changing the CO2 propellant charge inside powder/foam/water extinguishers.

Are your ships for a specialised purpose that means they have to carry a mass recharge plant for extinguishers?

Recharging CO2 at sea is difficult because the whole unit is pressurised and has to be maintained at a certain pressure. This means the unit has to stay air tight which is difficult to achieve in a ships recharge station. I thought that the caps on the CO2 portable extinguishers were an integrally formed part of the bottle so they can't be removed and non return valves mean that you can't feed CO2 the other way down the system.

After seeking clarification on this issue from SOLAS and the FSS code, there is nothing in the regs that say you can't recharge a CO2 extinguisher onboard. However, guidance in the FSS code on recharging is based on Foam/Water/Powder. There is little/no guidance on CO2 recharging and I can't help but feel that if it is a usual practice there would be.