Bill - A question on the non-operating fire system. Did you confirm that the bottle was actually empty? If I recall correctly, the AutoPro systems are halon. If so, a "full" reading on the gauge should indicate that the bottle actually had halon (unless the gauge itself was defective). If the system just didn't release halon when you pulled/pushed the button, it could be that, even though the bottle was full, the actuator failed to puncture the rupture disc on the bottle. My local fire system company says that this happens more often than it should. Apparently, sometimes that end of the actuator isn't sharp enough to puncture the disc, or the plunger gets dirty and doesn't move at all.

I had the latter happen myself - and it saved me a recharge. I was fixing a friend's car when I found he had left his safety pin out and accidentally pulled the release. But nothing had happened. The bottle was still full because the actuator had gotten dirty enough that the spring-loaded plunger didn't move. When I disassembled, cleaned and re-lubed the actuator, it worked okay. Better I found the problem that way than having it fail when it was needed.