CONSORTIUM
Four
European research groups were sponsored to conduct a project entitled
Fire Performance of Electric Cables (FIPEC) The project began in 1996
and lasted for three years. The FIPEC consortium consists of Interscience
Communications Ltd UK (Steve Grayson, Andrew Green), CESI Italy (Uberto
Vercellotti), ISSeP Belgium (Hervé Breulet) and SP Sweden (Patrick Van
Hees).
BACKGROUND
This
project has been formulated because of several needs within the cable
making and using industry which include:
- Need
for a more sensitive international standard than IEC 60332-3 that can
be used to differentiate between adequate, good, very good and excellent
cables.
- Need
for results to be produced so that they can be used in fire engineering
appraisals. Existing IEC and US methods do not readily allow this.
- Need
for cable manufacturers and users to be able to predict the likely performance
in expensive type approval tests from confident usage of small scale
tests.
- Need
for materials producers to have confident indicators of the fire performance
of their products in cable applications early in the development cycle
rather than after expensive cable prototypes and tests have been carried
out.
PROJECT
OBJECTIVES
- Develop
or modify fire test methods for electrical cables offering improvements
on existing IEC test methods.
- Develop
or adapt the cone calorimeter (bench scale heat release) test in order
to be able to use it for small-scale testing of electrical cables.
- Develop
correlation models for the prediction of fire performance of electrical
cables based on the results of the small-scale tests.
- Develop
bases for calculation models for the prediction of realistic fire performance
of electrical cables, in some key constructions, based on the results
of small-scale tests on materials.
- Investigate
the validity of models developed by comparing the output from models
with realistic design fire tests data.
- Provide
guidance for the standards.
STRATEGIES
The
objectives were targeted using experimental data generated at real, large
and small scale and by validating the performances seen in the smaller
scale tests against the real scale using correlations and models. This
is a similar strategy to that successfully used for projects examining
other products
PROGRAMME
OF WORK
The
experimental work was carried out at different scales and linked by correlation
and fire modelling studies which form the scientific foundations for standards
upon which the fire performance measurements can be based. The experiments
were carried out at four scales ranging from small material samples to
real scale cable installations:
- Real-scale
scenario tests carried out on model electric cable installations
- Full-scale
standard tests carried out on cable trays (based on IEC 60332-3; smaller
than 1)
- Small-scale
tests on cables carried out in a cone calorimeter
- Small-scale
tests on materials carried out in a cone calorimeter
The
work wascarried out as a series of managed work items each being undertaken
by a minimum of two partners. The project took 3 years with the survey
and much of the experimental work being carried out in year 1 and the
analysis and model development being completed by the end of year 3. The
specific work programmes are:
- WP
1: Review of European cable installations and planning of real-scale
scenarios test series
- WP
2: Investigate the effects of variables on a full-scale test
- WP
3: Develop small-scale cable test that can determine the essential parameters
- WP
4: Develop small-scale material test
- WP
5: Construct cables
- WP
6: Conduct real-scale fire tests
- WP
7: Conduct full-scale standard tests
- WP
8: Conduct small-scale cable tests
- WP
9: Conduct small-scale tests on materials (sheaths and insulations)
- WP
10: Validate full-scale standard tests by correlation to real-scale
tests in the European scenarios defined in WI 1
- WP
11: Correlate the small-scale test results to the full-scale standard
test results
- WP
12: Develop bases for correlation of results of small-scale tests on
materials to small-scale test results on cables
- WP
13: Development of a mathematical model for the prediction of heat release
rate and flame propagation of burning cables in real fires and full-scale
tests from the results of small-scale tests on cable specimens
- WP
14: Develop a measurement system proposal based on the existing measurement
system and the information obtained
- WP
15: Prepare guidelines for use in the production of standards
- WP
16: Data management
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