C4 Fire & Security integrates SANS 10139 fire detection with your existing CCTV, access control and building management systems across Cape Town and the Western Cape. BACnet, Modbus and dry-contact relay. Commissioned, tested and witnessed.
Fire and security integration means the fire detection panel drives your other building systems on a confirmed alarm. Cameras start recording, escape-route doors release, the building management system is told, and the graphics workstation shows which device triggered. One event, four systems responding, no human relay in the middle.
C4 Fire & Security integrates commercial fire detection with existing security and building systems across Cape Town and the Western Cape, working from its base at The Simondium Guild on the R45 between Klapmuts and Franschhoek. The addressable panels C4 installs support three integration paths: BACnet for building management front ends, Modbus for industrial and SCADA equipment, and volt-free dry-contact relay for anything else, which between them cover the large majority of systems already installed in South African commercial property. Four outputs are commissioned and witnessed: CCTV recording triggered on a confirmed zone alarm, access-controlled doors released on the escape route, alarm and fault states published to a building management system, and addressable device-level detail pushed to a graphical front end. Integration with an existing system typically adds one to two days to commissioning. Scope is fixed at the free site assessment, not estimated at quote stage. C4 brings over 30 years of combined fire-engineering experience and holds SAQCC Level 5 qualifications, the highest fire-safety competency recognised in South Africa.
A C4 addressable fire panel can drive four things on your existing systems: CCTV recording, access-control door release, building management system alerts and a graphical front end. Each one is configured during commissioning, proved during cause-and-effect testing and demonstrated to you before handover.
| System | What C4 drives | Trigger |
|---|---|---|
| CCTV | Trigger camera recording on alarm | Confirmed zone alarm |
| Access control | Release doors for evacuation | Confirmed zone alarm |
| BMS | Feed the building management system | Alarm, fault and isolate states |
| Graphical front end | Push detail to the graphics workstation | Addressable device and zone data |
A confirmed alarm on the fire panel raises a relay that tells your existing CCTV system to start or flag recording on the cameras covering that zone. The footage exists before anyone reaches the panel, which is what an insurer and an incident investigation both ask for first.
Access-controlled doors on the escape route release on a confirmed alarm, so a controlled building does not become a trapped one. The release is driven from the fire panel rather than from the access system, which keeps the life-safety decision on the life-safety device.
Alarm, fault and isolate states are published to your building management system over BACnet or Modbus, so fire sits on the same dashboard as HVAC, lifts and power rather than on a panel nobody walks past.
Addressable detail, meaning the specific device and zone rather than just "fire", is fed to an existing graphical front end or gate-house workstation, so security dispatches to the right unit instead of walking the whole site.
C4 fire panels integrate over BACnet, Modbus or dry-contact relay. BACnet suits building management front ends, Modbus suits industrial and SCADA equipment, and a volt-free dry contact will drive almost anything regardless of brand or age. The site assessment picks the one your existing system actually supports.
The building-automation standard most BMS front ends already speak. Suits sites where fire needs to appear alongside HVAC, lifts and metering on one dashboard.
Widely supported on industrial plant and SCADA equipment. Suits factories, cold stores and process sites where the existing supervisory system is not a commercial BMS.
The lowest common denominator, and often the right answer. A volt-free contact will drive almost any third-party panel, recorder or door controller regardless of age or brand.
If your existing panel is a third-party unit, what it exposes decides what is possible. That check is the first thing C4 does on site, before anything is quoted.
Integration matters most where the person who needs to act is not standing at the fire panel. Data centres, sectional-title estates, warehouses, shopping centres, hospitals and wine estates across the Western Cape all share that shape: the alarm happens in one place and the response has to start in another.
Suppression release, access lockout and camera capture have to happen in the right order, and be evidenced afterwards.
A gate house watching 8 to 30 buildings needs to know which unit, not just that something is alarming.
Smoke-extraction fans, roller shutters and dock doors interlock off a confirmed alarm.
Centre management runs one control room. Fire that only lives on a panel in a plant room is a blind spot.
Phased evacuation depends on doors, lifts and staff alerting behaving as one system.
Production and cellar areas are often unmanned after hours, so the fire signal has to reach whoever is watching the cameras.
Integration adds roughly one to two days to commissioning on most sites with an existing system. That covers interface configuration, cause-and-effect testing across both systems and a witnessed demonstration. The scope is fixed at the free site assessment, so it does not arrive as a surprise at handover.
A SAQCC-qualified C4 engineer records the make and model of your CCTV recorder, access controller and BMS front end, and confirms what each one can accept. This is where a third-party panel either opens the door or closes it.
You decide what should happen on a confirmed alarm, door by door and camera by camera. It is written down before anything is wired, because this is the document the commissioning test is run against.
Interface cards, relay outputs and protocol addressing are set up on the fire panel and mapped to the third-party system. Fire remains the controlling device throughout.
Every cause-and-effect line is proved live, not on paper. Zone alarms are raised, doors are watched, cameras are checked and BMS states are read back.
The integration is demonstrated to you, then handed over with the SANS 10139 commissioning pack, as-built drawings and the maintenance logbook. Optional 24/7 fire panel monitoring from R495 per month can be added at this point.
C4 Fire & Security is a fire engineering business. On this page we are describing integration: connecting the fire detection system we design and commission to the CCTV, access control and building management systems you already own.
We would rather be clear about that than sell you something twice. If you are buying new security hardware, bring us in while it is still being specified. Getting the fire panel and the new system to talk is straightforward when it is designed in, and considerably less so when it is retrofitted two years later.
Yes. Modern addressable fire panels support BACnet, Modbus and dry-contact relay integration, which is enough to drive most existing CCTV, access control and building management systems. C4 Fire & Security can trigger CCTV recording on alarm, release access-controlled doors for evacuation, send alerts to a BMS and feed an existing graphical front end. Integration scope is agreed during the free site assessment.
This page covers integration, not supply. C4 Fire & Security designs, installs and commissions the fire detection and suppression side, and connects it to the security and building systems you already own. If you are procuring new CCTV or access control hardware, speak to us first so the fire panel and the new system are specified to talk to each other from day one rather than being retrofitted afterwards.
Both work. Integration is simplest and least disruptive when it is designed in with the fire detection system, because the interface cards and cable routes are planned once. Retrofitting onto an existing C4 panel is routine. Retrofitting onto a third-party panel depends on what that panel exposes, which is the first thing the site assessment checks.
Most integrations with an existing system add roughly one to two days to commissioning. That covers the interface configuration, the cause-and-effect testing across both systems and the witnessed demonstration. Larger sites, or sites where the third-party system is undocumented, take longer, which is why the scope is set at the site assessment rather than guessed at the quote stage.
No, provided the fire system remains the controlling device. SANS 10139 governs the design, installation, commissioning and maintenance of automatic fire detection and alarm systems in South African commercial buildings. Integration outputs are additional to that, not a substitute for it. C4 commissions the fire system to SANS 10139 first, then proves the integration outputs on top of it during cause-and-effect testing.
The fire system carries on doing its job. Integration is built so that the fire panel drives the outputs, and a failure of the CCTV, access or BMS side cannot suppress a fire alarm or stop an evacuation. That is the reason the release of escape-route doors is driven from the fire panel rather than from the access control system.
A SAQCC-qualified C4 Fire & Security engineer visits your site, audits the fire panel and the systems around it, and comes back with a written scope covering what can be integrated, what cannot, and what it costs. Free, across Cape Town, the Cape Winelands, the Northern Suburbs, the Helderberg and the West Coast.
