Investigation on vertical temperature profile of thermal ejected plume from a compartment fire with an adjacent side wall

Abstract

This paper presents an investigation of vertical temperature profile of the thermal ejected plume from a compartment fire with an adjacent side wall, which has not been quantified in the literatures. A full-scale compartment model with a vertical facade and an adjacent side wall positioned at the side of the window has been set up in the numerical simulations. The vertical temperature distribution upon the facade with various window dimensions, total heat release rates and side wall separation distances is measured. By comparing with former study, the validity of the numerical simulation results has been confirmed, which shows good agreement with the previous experimental data. Result reveals that only when the side wall separation distance (D) is less than a critical value for each window dimension, will the vertical temperature profile of thermal ejected plume affect by the constraining boundary of adjacent side wall, otherwise it will remain basically the same. Then, a new correlation is proposed to describe the constraining effect of side wall on the vertical temperature profile by introducing a coefficient α. Numerical simulation results for various window dimensions, total heat release rates and side wall separation distances can be well collapsed by the newly proposed correlation.