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Abstract
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Arguably, one of the most important requirement a building have to meet in case of fire is to ensure the safe evacuation of its users and the work of rescue teams. Consequently, issues related to the risks associated with falling parts of facades are fairly well known around Europe. Even though not equally well defined as other fire safety requirements concerning glazed facades, there is plenty of test methods for assessment of facades regarding falling parts, mostly based on an approach related to fire spread. In this paper selection of test method for assessment of facades regarding falling parts is briefly presented. However, focus of this work is on fire test of typical glazed segment of façade performed in ITB Laboratory.
RESULTS of the test positively verifies conjecture that solutions with glass units configured with thin, tempered glass panes on the outer side should pose no threat. However, the question has been raised whether the behaviour of other glass unit solutions (with additional coatings or laminated) would be similar.
Because of its high aesthetics and ease of installation glazed façades are being increasingly used as the outer walls of modern buildings. Defined usually as curtain walls they provide the perfect climate baffle and adequate lighting for variety of facilities.
Façade is a type of wall which usually consists of vertical and horizontal structural members, connected together and fixed to the floor supporting structure of the building to form a lightweight space enclosing continuous skin, which provides, by itself or in conjunction with the building construction all the normal functions of the external wall but doesn't take on any of the load bearing characteristics of the building. The walls of this type are performed frequently as the structural work in which the spaces between the metal profiles are filled with panes of clear or frosted glass. According to the current trends in contemporary architecture glazing, filling curtain walls should be of large dimensions. This is quite a challenge for both designers and contractors of glazed facades which besides eye catch look have to meet all normal functions of the non-load bearing exterior wall, including those related with fire safety.
The most important task building have to meet in case of fire is to ensure the safety of its users and rescue teams. Therefore the risk associated with the possibility of parts falling from the exterior wall in case of fire cannot be overlooked. For fire resistant façades, glazed with special glass panes this problem is arguably eliminated. In practice, more often, the fire resistance of the external wall is limited only to the spandrel areas, which allows the use of non-fire rated glass panes in the remaining space of the facade. This solution is sufficient to stop the spread of fire to adjacent floors of the building, but may pose certain risks associated with the possibility of large pieces of the façade falling. The problem is mainly related with the behavior of glass units under the influence of high temperature during a fire. Therefore ensuring the safety of evacuating users and rescue teams may also depends on the behavior of specified glazed unit fixing and structure. It is assumed that if, under the influence of fire, the outer layer of glass unit will break up into small pieces and fall down, it poses no threat. In opposition, if glass unit falls off as a whole (or in large, heavy pieces) then the danger is substantial.
Considering the above, the Fire Research Department of Building Research Institute (ITB) conducted the fire test of the façade specimen glazed with one of the typical, commonly used solution of glass units. The results of the test as well as the conclusions drawn from it are presented in this paper.
Language: en |