Travelling Fire in Full-Scale Experimental Building

Abstract

In order to follow modern trends in contemporary building architecture which is moving off the limits of current design fire models, new methods aimed at developing of both fire development and structural behaviour are needed. With the view to expand family of traditional design fire models travelling fire is investigated. The paper describes travelling fire test in experimental building performed in September 2011 in Czech Republic. As flames were spreading across the compartment considerable temperature gradients appeared. In this paper, the numerical simulation of the travelling fire test completed by using FDS (Fire Dynamics Simulator) is compared with simulation of compartment fire with uniform temperature conditions to highlight the potential impact of the gas temperature heterogeneity on structural behaviour. The temperature measurements from the fire test are used to validate the simulation of travelling fire in FDS. The fire test in middle large compartment which has provided important data for design model of travelling fire and its impact on structural behaviour, proves that there are clear needs and benefits in using a travelling design fire as the basis for structural design .