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Nature, 183, pp. 653-655, 1959-03-01
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Ser
THJ.
NPI_I2
no. 6L
c . 2
BI,DG
NATIONAL RESEARCTI COUNCIL
CANADA
DIVISION OF BUILDING RESEARCH
NEW CANADIAN
FIRE RESEARCH LABORATORY
By R. F. LEGGET
A N A L Y Z E D
(Reprinted lrom Nature, Vol. 183, pp. 653455, March 7, 1959)
TECIINICAL PAPER No. 61
OF THE
DIYISION OT' BUILDING RESEARCH
".fla'1^oi
OTTAWA
March 1959
N.R.C.5101
3a
tR173-Price 10 cents
This publication is being distributed by the Division of Building .Research of the National Research Council as'a eontribution towards better building in Canada. It should not be reproduced in whole or in pa,rt, without perrnission of the original publisher. The Division wou-ld be glad to be of assistance in obtaining such permission.
Publications of the Division of Building Research may be obtained by mailing the appropriate remit-tanee (a Bank, Exprgss, or Post.Office Money Order or a cheque made payablo at par in Otta,wa, to the Receiver General of Canada, credit, National F,esearch Council) to the National Research Council, Ottawa. Sta,mps a,re not acceptable.
A, coupon system ha,s been introduced to make pa5rments for publications relatively sircnple. Coupons are available iq donominations of 5, 25, a'nd.50 cents, and may be obtained by ,rnaking a, re$ritf,ance as iqdicated above. lhese coupons may be used for the purchaee of all National ReEerch Council publications iqcluding specifications of the Canadian Goverament SpecifieationeBoard. i '
(Reprinted lrom Nature; ltol. 183, pp. 653-655, March 7, 1959)
NEW CANADIAN FIRE RESEARCH
LABORATORY
By R. F. LEGGET
Director, Division of Building Research, National Research Council of Canada
tlIR,E rosearch in Canada advanced significantly F with the opening on October 3 of the new Fire Research Laboratory of the National B,esearch Council of Canada at Ottawa. The nbw building forms part of the Building Research Centre of the Council's Division of Building R,esearch- ft' is situa,ted on the extensive property of the Council known as the Montreal Road Laboratories, an area, of about 400 acres in which the three enginooring rosearch divisions of the National B,esearch Council and some other Council est'ablishments aro situat'ed. The official opening of the building was performed by Dr. F. M. Lea, director of the British Building Research Stdtion, assisted by Mr. Dennis Lawson,
wero givon to the conference, including proliminary resultJ from full-scale burns of oight buildings in the small town of Aultsville, abandoned because of flooding caused by the construction of the inter-national powor dam on the St' Lawrence.
The fire research building (Fig. l) has basically the shape of a large T, with officos and laboratories in tho-front wingfand tho largo furnaco laboratory and a-burn drea-for model studies in the rear wing' Ono-story additions have been erected on eithor sido of tjho furna,ce laboratory to provido storage and wgrkshop facilities, garago space for tha Fta.lio.n
(Photograph : National nilm Boaril of Cmarla) Fig. 1. tr'ire Research Building of the Division of Building Research, National Research Council, Ottawa
waqon used in field investigations, a control room for"the opera,tion of the fire-resistance furnaces, and additional laboratory facilities for hydraulic
t-esting-The building covers an a,rea of 20,000 sq. ft. and has a t'otal volume of more than 550,000 cu. ft., of which nearly half is made up of the volume of the 40-ft. high structure housing the furna,ce laboratory and the burn area. The total contract prico, including all extra,s, which amounted t'o less ttn"n 4 per cent, of the origina,l cost, was 820,000 dollars, or a cost per cubic foot of less than 1.50 dollars.
-
The building, founded throughout on solid rocl<, consists of a sl,ructural'steel frame supported on reinforced concret'e. The out3ide wd,lls, built of structural cla,v tile, are finished with stucco on rnetal lath on the outside and with glazed tile on thb inside. 'Ihe area to the rear of the X'ire Resea,rch Building was the site of an old quarry. It's rocky floor, which is approximately 5-I0 ft. below t'Jle le.'rel of the surrounding arca, provides an excellent,outdoor experimenta,l site on which to conduct, la,rge-scale tesls on oxtinguishing fires.
The fire-resistance test facilitios consist of two furnacos, completo with auxiliary equipment,, together with the associated facilities for constructing, hand-Iing, condit,ioning and disposing of large tes!-.speci-mens. The design of the specia,l facilities contained in the laboratory was carried ott concurrently with the design and construction of the building itself, by a separate firm qf consultants, Ewbank and Pdvtners (Canada), Ltd., working in co-operation with the architects a,nd engineers for the building.
The wall furnace (Fig. 2) consists essontially of a movable burner assembly open a,t the front, with the burners situated in the rear wall of the unit,. The combustion cha,mber is cornplet'ed when the front face of the burner assemblv is fixed to the specimen under test. In this position the top of the furnace is immediately under the flue used for rernoving the combust'ion ga,ses.
The size of the specimon exposed to the combustion chambor is 12 ft. bv 12 ft., alt'hough the loading frame itself will accomrrrodate a specimen 14 ft,. by 14 ft. The heat in the combust'ion chamber is sup-plied by 100 burners hawing a capacity of 50 cu. ft. of gas per hour a1l a, pressure of 25 lb./in.'z. The fuel used is propane, having a gross heat'ing vahre of approximately 2,500 r.r.u./cu. ft. ; thus tho max-imum t'otal heat, input is approximately 12,500,000 B.T;u./hr.
The floor furnace (Fig. 3), in contrast to the wall furnace, is a fixed installation. The burners are installed in the two lonE sides and the two flues ane perrnanently connected t'o the common fluo usod for
(Photngro,ph: Natima.l Fi,lm BMrd of Canndn) tr'ig. 2. Loading frame with wall specimen in wall funace in the
furnace laboratory
conducting the flue gases from the building. The cornbustion chamber is completed when the specimen is laid on top of tho furna,ce.
The furna,ce at prosent will allow a floor specimen to havo an &rea of L2 ft. by f[ ft. exposed to heat. When using this furnace for tosting beamS it will be possible to extend a beam past the fuurace wall a,nd load this portion of tho beam as well.
Hoat ii supplieil by means of thirty burners (fifteen on each side), each burner having a capacity of 220 cru.. ft. of gas per hour at a pressure of 25 lb./in.r. As in the case of the wall furnace, propene will be the fuel, so that the gross heat input is approximately
r6,500,000 B.r.u./hr.
Liquid propane is stored in a 1,750-gallon ta,nk situated outside the building. When oporating the furnaces, the liquid is passed through three waporizers, ea,ch capable of vaporizing 70 gallons of propane per hour al, 25lb.lrr..,. The gas is then piped underground in a 4-in. pipe to the building. Inside the building the propa,no then passes through a diaphragm motor
(Photograph : Natiml FiIm Board, of Canndal Fig. 3. x'loor furnace in the furnace laboratory
control valve, which closes if there is a failure of the control air. There is a pilot flame by-pass valve in the line before the motor control valve, and two shut-off gas cocks immediately after this valve direct the flow either to the floor or to the wall furnace. The wall furnace has ten banks of burners with ten burners in each bank, while the floor furnace has five banks of three burners each on each side. Each group of three burners is fitted with a solenoid-actuated shut-off valwo and pressure gauge.
Tho combustion control for both of the furnaces is furnished by a potentiomefric temperature-pro-grarnmo controller which follows the tirne - tem-perature curve designated in the curront, IJ.S. Standard (ASTM ElL9-57, Standard Methods of Fire Tests of Building Const'ruction and Materials).
Tho two large furnaces will be put to use immedi-ately for carrying out, tests upon tho fire-resistance of building mat'erials in curront use in Canada. These tests must be done since tho furnaces a,re rrnique in Canada,, but they involve an elemont of rosearch, and the furnaces will be used for rosea,rch investigations whenevor possible. In the laboratories, studies will continue on-tho properties of foam as an oxtinguisher of fire, into the problems of radiation from firo and on more detailed questions such as those
related to the burning characteristics of materials. The results of all work will be made available to the committees responsible for the National Building Code of Canada for incorporation into successiva revisions. Tho Code is an -advisory document, oub-lished by the National Researbh Council of Canada. and has legal effect only when adopted by municipal-itios for their own local use. ft, is already in legal uso in- this way for woll over one-third of the population of Canada. As its adoption spreads, the resulls of tho fire research programme will therofore be of diroct offect, to a large proportion of tho people of the Dominion.
A list of all publicatioos of the Division of Building Research is available a,nd ma,y bo obtained from the Publications Section, Divisioq of Building Resoarch, National Reeearcb Council, Ottawa, Canada.
