Attic fan in garage ceiling

[Craig Owen]

I inspected a house today with an attic fan installed in the garage ceiling, never seen this before. The fan is not vented to the exterior. Is this OK? fire separation, venting into attic.

[rlind]

If there is not a sufficient firewall between the house portion and the garage, then a significant fire hazard exists due to the fan being a breach in the firewall in the garage ceiling.

I'd write up myself!

[Jay Moge]

could you imagine if a fire broke out in the garage and that fan sucked it strait up to the attic? i don't like it either.

[Marcel R. Cyr]

A garage area should provide at least a one hour protection to fire in all caeses if it is attached to the house.

An exhaust fan would breach that 1- hour protection and cause considerable damage to the structure for it's existance.

Although, a true 1-hour protectection is qualified as 5/8" and two sides of the walls, and ceiling would require 1/2" + 7/8" hat shape channel and another layer of 1/2".

I would imagine that in Residential arenas that this does not happen to often anyways.

I would write it up as you did and hope that it is corrected in the future.

But, that is up to the client, is'nt it?

Good job.

Marcel