Small-scale single burning item test for the study of the fire behavior of building materials

Abstract

A small-scale single burning item test has been developed to allow quicker, easier and less costly development studies of building materials presenting high performance. The test is fully described including the dimensions of the equipment, the procedure used to perform the test, but also the methodology used for the calibration of the heat release rate (HRR) and smoke production. To study the efficiency of the test, different rigid polyurethane and rigid polyisocyanurate foams, with and without flame retardants, are used as case studies and their fire behavior evaluated. The small-scale single burning item test allowed discriminating the different foams in terms of HRR and flame spread, but also in terms of FIGRA and SMOGRA index. It also permits an easy use of additional sensors (thermocouples) leading to a better understanding of the fire behavior. The results were compared to data obtained from the mass loss cone (ISO13927). The results in terms of HRR and smoke lead to similar conclusion but compared to mass loss cone, the small-scale single burning item test makes it possible to access the flame spread behavior of the materials, which is a crucial parameter and leads to an additional discrimination of the performance of the materials.