Experimental and Numerical Methods for Evaluating Fire Performance of Materials

该研究计划的长期目标是提高对火灾期间高热通量和高温下材料的传热和传质的认识。了解这些条件下的传热和传质至关重要，尤其是在评估消防安全时。在这段时间内，将通过关注两个特定的应用程序来实现总体研究目标，其中文献，行业，监管机构和最终用户表示需要改进模型以及设计和评估工具。 床垫和消费品。 虽然建筑材料和系统的防火性能（例如，墙壁）和消费产品（例如，床垫）是使用全尺寸测试来评估用于调节目的的，但是这种测试非常昂贵并且存在有限的测试设施。使用小规模测试来预测全尺寸火灾行为的方法将显著降低设计者、制造商和监管机构的火灾测试成本。然而，目前并不存在可靠的缩放方法。 我们的团队已经确定了有潜力预测床垫和其他消费品中聚氨酯泡沫全面防火性能的缩放方法。这些方法将得到改进，以更好地预测火灾的发展，并将开发一个火焰蔓延模型，沿着推荐的小规模试验程序，用于生成缩放模型的输入数据。将开发完整实芯床垫的缩放方法，并考虑到聚氨酯泡沫与用作覆盖物和防火屏障的织物的相互作用。 热防护服 我们现有的单层防护织物的传热模型将被扩展到预测消防员穿着的防护织物的反应，其中包括额外的层来管理水分运动和增加隔热。特别感兴趣的是相对长期的，主要是辐射暴露，例如在建筑物外的消防期间。水分传输，这在消防员的安全和舒适性中起着重要作用，将被添加到模型中，这将使用实验室规模的织物测试进行验证。 由于大多数标准测试都是破坏性的，因此还将开发非破坏性测试，以评估在用服装的持续性能。我们小组开发的使用颜色和红外反射率测量来预测拉伸强度变化的技术将得到改进，并将开发额外的测试来监测和预测水分转移性能，热保护和其他性能方面的退化。也将考虑由于洗涤、磨损和紫外线辐射引起的降解。研究将有助于更好地确定何时应该更换衣服，从而大大提高消防员以及石油和天然气，采矿和其他行业工人的安全性。

The long-term objective of this research program is to improve the knowledge of heat and mass transfer in materials subjected to high heat fluxes and temperatures during fires. Understanding heat and mass transfer under these conditions is critical, especially when evaluating fire safety. During this time period, progress will be made towards the overall research objective by focusing on two particular applications, where the literature, industry, regulators and end users indicate the need for improved models, and design and evaluation tools. Mattresses and Consumer Products. While the fire performance of building materials and systems (e.g., walls) and consumer products (e.g., mattresses) is evaluated for regulatory purposes using full-scale tests, such tests are very expensive and there are limited test facilities. Methods to predict full-scale fire behavior using small-scale tests would significantly reduce costs of fire testing for designers, manufacturers and regulators. However, reliable scaling methods do not currently exist. Our group has identified scaling methods with the potential to predict full-scale fire performance of polyurethane foam found in mattresses and other consumer products. These methods will be refined to better predict fire growth, and a flame spread model will be developed, along with recommended small scale test procedures for generating input data for the scaling models. Scaling methods for complete solid-core mattresses will be developed, taking into account the interaction of polyurethane foam with fabrics used as covers and fire barriers. Thermal Protective Clothing Our existing heat transfer models of single layer protective fabrics will be extended to predict the response of protective fabrics worn by firefighters, which include additional layers to manage moisture movement and increase thermal insulation. Of particular interest are relatively long term, primarily radiant exposures, such as during firefighting outside of a building. Moisture transport, which plays a major role in firefighter safety and comfort, will be added to the models, which will be validated using bench-scale fabric tests. As most standard tests are destructive, non-destructive tests will also be developed to evaluate the continuing performance of in-use clothing. Techniques that our group developed to predict changes in tensile strength using colour and infrared reflectance measurements will be refined, and additional tests will be developed to monitor and predict degradation of moisture transfer properties, thermal protection and other aspects of performance. Degradation due to laundering, abrasion and ultraviolet radiation will also be considered. Research will help better determine when clothing should be replaced, significantly improving safety of firefighters, and workers in the oil and gas, mining and other industries.