Evaluation of Fire Risk Rating of Building Materials by Chung’s Equation-IX

Abstract

This study evaluated the fire risk of building materials by calculating the fire risk index-IX (FRI-IX) and fire risk rating (FRR) according to Chung's equations-VII, Chung's equations-VIII, and Chung's equation-IX. White ash, hard maple, willow, fraxinus mandschurica, Sargent cherry, and polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) were selected as specimens. The combustion characteristics of the specimens were tested via cone calorimetry according to ISO 5660-1. After combustion, the fire performance index-VII (FPI-VII) of the specimens, as calculated by Chung's equations, varied between 23.51 and 87.84 s2/kW, and the fire growth index-VII (FGI-VII) varied between 0.0025 and 0.0170 kW/s2. The fire performance index-VIII (FPI-VIII) and fire growth index-VIII (FGI-VIII) based on polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) varied between 0.44 and 1.66, and between 3.13 and 21.25, respectively. The fire risk index-IX (FRI-IX), which is the fire risk rating, showed that willow had a very high fire risk, with an FRI-IX value of 48.30 (fire risk rating: G). Materials with fast time to ignition (TTI), short time to reach 1st_peak smoke production rate (TSPR1st_peak), and high (CO/CO2) mean production rate ratio (COPmean/CO2Pmean) values owing to low volume density had low FPI-VII and FPI-VIII, and high FGI-VII and FGI-VIII, resulting in high FRI-IX values.