Citation

Santangelo PE, Tarozzi L, Tartarini P. Fire (Basel) 2022; 5(6): e214.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2022, MDPI: Multidisciplinary Digital Publications Institute)

DOI

10.3390/fire5060214

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Sauna is a common fixture in many facilities; a specific fire-protection system is typically designed and installed for this application, as short circuits or direct contact with incandescent materials may result in a fire. Water mist has been recently considered as a promising option for this purpose; so, assessing its control and suppression capability in a sauna configuration has become of paramount importance for designers and engineers. To this end, an unprecedented real-scale test rig was built and instrumented with thermocouples and a hot-plate thermometer towards the evaluation of water-mist performance against various fire scenarios and, ultimately, to provide guidelines to designers. Timber benches were employed as target materials, while the fire was initiated in a wood crib. Design parameters, such as initial room temperature, location of the ignition source, nozzle-to-wall distance, and air gap between benches and wall, were varied, also including natural ventilation in a dedicated experiment. The system proved successful in controlling and containing the fire: bench damage ratio--selected as a quantitative parameter to assess water-mist performance--was consistently lower than 5%. However, extinction was not always achieved, especially under the most challenging configuration in terms of ventilation, initial room temperature, and nozzle-to-wall distance.

Language: en

Keywords

air gap; damage ratio; room temperature; thermometry; timber; ventilation