Experimental study of building materials’ reaction to fire by cone calorimeter measurements and development of a correlation model with results of single burning item method
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Date
2023-10-18
Authors
Μπαλαράς, Άγγελος
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Abstract
The present Diploma Thesis deals with the study of reaction to fire of building construction products. The experimental part of this work is performed using the Cone Calorimeter. This bench-scale apparatus offers the possibility to measure important quantities of a burning material (heat release, smoke production etc.). Based on this data, all building materials are classified in the European system (EUROCLASS). The most widespread testing method for such classification is the Single Burning Item (SBI), which specifies FIGRA (maximum Fire Growth Rate) and SMOGRA (maximum Smoke Growth Rate) indices. Ultimately, this work aims to predict the class of certain materials (pine wood, polyethylene foam and cable sheath) in the SBI, using data obtained from the Cone Calorimeter. To achieve this, selected prediction models are used including the ConeTools model, the One–Dimensional (1D) Thermal Flame Spread model and Computational models for Smoke Production.
This Diploma Thesis focuses on elaborating the fundamental principles regarding fire phenomena, flame spread on surfaces and materials reaction to fire. This work consists of ten chapters.
1) Chapter 1: offers a general overview of the topic, setting the goals of this work.
2) Chapter 2: presents fire and combustion phenomena accompanied by the main principles of heat transfer.
3) Chapter 3: describes the reaction to fire testing methods, focusing on Cone Calorimetry and SBI.
4) Chapter 4: provides an overview of EUROCLASS and its categorization criteria.
5) Chapter 5: includes the theory of flame spread on surfaces.
6) Chapter 6: presents selected methodologies of prediction models.
7) Chapter 7: specifies the behavior of the testing specimens under fire conditions as observed during the Cone Calorimeter tests.
8) Chapter 8: collects the experimental results derived from the Cone Calorimeter and outlines the developed computational tool.
9) Chapter 9: presents the computational findings resulted from the tool.
10) Chapter 10: summarizes the main achievements and presents the evaluation of the findings of this work.
Concluding, this work provides all the data necessary to make the Euroclassification prediction of the tested products. The final results enable the possibility to evaluate the models’ accuracy and make suggestions for future studies.
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Keywords
Reaction to fire tests, Cone calorimeter measurements, Single burning item method (SBI), Euroclassification prediction models, Evaluation of computational and experimental findings