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    Travelling Fires For Structural Design

    Uploaded by

    Guillermo Rein
    Keynote delivered at SFPE 11th Conference on Performance-Based Codes and Fire Safety Design Methods, Warsaw, May 2016.

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Travelling Fires For Structural Design

    Uploaded by

    Guillermo Rein
    262 views25 pages
    Keynote delivered at SFPE 11th Conference on Performance-Based Codes and Fire Safety Design Methods, Warsaw, May 2016.

    Original Title

    Travelling Fires for Structural Design

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    © © All Rights Reserved

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    Keynote delivered at SFPE 11th Conference on Performance-Based Codes and Fire Safety Design Methods, Warsaw, May 2016.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    262 views25 pages

    Travelling Fires For Structural Design

    Uploaded by

    Guillermo Rein
    Keynote delivered at SFPE 11th Conference on Performance-Based Codes and Fire Safety Design Methods, Warsaw, May 2016.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
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    Travelling Fires

    for Structural Design


    Dr Guillermo Rein
    Department of
    Mechanical Engineering

    Sponsors:
    CERIB

    Across Disciplines
    Fire &
    Structures

    Fire

    Structures

    The interface between fire and structures is the


    intersection of the two sets

    Lame Substitution of the 1st kind


    Fire &
    Structures

    Fire

    Failure of
    structure
    at T = XC

    When structural engineers are entirely


    replaced by pseudo-science.
    It still survives in many standards.

    Lame Substitution of the 2nd kind


    Fire &
    Structures

    Structures

    When fire engineers are entirely replaced by pseudo-science.


    It is mainstream.

    Lame Substitution of the 3rd kind


    Fire &
    Structures
    Failure of
    structures at
    T=XC

    When both fire and structural engineers are simultaneously


    replaced by pseudo-science.
    Any similarity with reality is a mere coincidence.

    Ancient Traditional Design Fires

    Standard Fire, 1880


    (on paper since 1912)
    Swedish Curves, 1972
    Eurocode Parametric
    Curves, 1995

    Imposed assumption:
    Uniform burning and uniform
    temperature, just like inside a
    furnace.

    Scale matters

    Here be
    Fire Tests

    Blind
    extrapolation

    Over there be
    Real Buildings

    Blind extrapolation
    from limited experience

    Fire in Furnace
    Fire in Normal
    compartment
    Fire in Large
    compartment

    Fire in Multistorey building

    Blind
    extrapolation

    Limitations

    For example, limitations according Eurocode:


    Floor areas < 500 m2

    Near rectangular enclosures


    Heights < 4 m

    No ceilings openings

    Moderate thermal-inertia of lining

    < 500 m2 floor?


    Rectangular?
    < 4 m high?

    Excel, London

    WTC Transit Hub

    Insulating lining?

    No ceiling opening?

    Arup/Peter Cook/VIEW

    The Shard

    Renzo Piano

    Arup Campus

    Love the Architects: design is out of bounds


    We surveyed 3,000
    compartments, most of
    the campus, in Kings
    Buildings at the
    University of Edinburgh.

    Buildings from 1850-1990: 66% of volume within limitations


    Buildings from 2000: 8% of volume within limitations (figure)
    Modern architecture increasingly produces buildings
    whose fire behaviour falls outside our field of knowledge

    Jonsdottir et al, Out of range, Fire Risk Management 2009

    The Titanic complied with all codes.


    Lawyers can make any device legal, only
    engineers can make them safe"
    Prof VM Brannigan
    University of Maryland

    WHY?
    Fires have been
    observed to travel across
    a floor plate burning
    over a limited area
    Non-uniform
    temperature
    distributions
    Long fire durations (up
    to 20 h Meridian Plaza)

    World Trade Centre, New York (2001)


    Windsor Tower, Madrid (2005)
    Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft (2008)
    Interstate Bank, Los Angeles (1988)
    One Meridian Plaza, Philadelphia (1991)

    Fire spread large floor


    Amax

    Amax

    *
    IGNITION

    SPREAD

    area of the fire increasing with time

    TRAVEL

    TRAVELLING FIRES METHODOLOGY

    FIRE SCEARIOS

    Travelling fires (TF)


    - 2.5%, 10%, 25%, and 48%

    Eurocode (EC) parametric


    curves
    - short-hot (SH) and long-cool (LC)

    Heat Transfer, Tg-> Ts


    STEEL

    TFM

    CONCRETE

    Structural Results Rebar Temperature


    500

    Rebar Temperature (C)

    2.5%
    400

    5%
    10%
    25%

    300

    50%
    100%

    200

    100

    0.1

    Law et al, Engineering Structures 2011

    Time (h)

    10

    100

    Family of fires not just one fire cast in stone

    Rebar Temperature

    range of sizes <=> range of spread rates

    LOCATION OF PEAK TEMPERATURE

    COMPARISON TO TRADITIONAL METHODS


    (steel + 60 min fire protection)

    Conclusions

    In large compartments, post-flashover


    fire cannot occur, but a travelling fire
    would develop.
    1. TFM is a novel framework
    complementing traditional methods
    2. TFM can produce more onerous
    conditions for the structure.
    3. TFM triggers previously unnoticed
    structural mechanisms.
    4. Among the fastest knowledgetransfer case from research to industry
    in FSE.
    ARUP

    4 Pancras Square

    Battersea

    Nova Victoria

    View 58

    The Scalpel

    39 iconic
    buildings
    in UK

    Two New Ludgate

    S2 Kings Cross

    Barlett, UCL

    One New Ludgate


    Kings House

    Sponsors:
    CERIB

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