Understanding Fire Ratings
Hello, Blake here from Tekta and today we’re discussing the 3 different types of fire rating!
Our first fire rating is known as Fire Integrity. This is the most basic level of fire protection. Doors that achieve an integrity rating prevent flame and hot gasses passing through a doorway in the event of a fire.
So, that’s the simple part done. From here-on, things get a little bit more technical. And that’s because fire rated doors have 2 purposes.
Firstly, they stop flames, as we’ve covered. But they’re also designed to prevent the transfer of heat in the event of a fire. Imagine there was a fire raging on the opposite side of a door. Even with the flames held back, the door is going to heat up over time which can cause 2 problems:
- First, if there was a highly combustible item placed in this corridor, it could eventually heat up enough to catch fire and the flames will then continue to spread through the building.
- And secondly, if this corridor happened to be a fire escape route, excessive heat radiated through that door would make the corridor impassable, leaving people unable escape the building.
There’s 2 ways to test and certify a doors ability to prevent the transfer of heat. The first being, what’s known as a Fire Radiation rating. During a radiation fire test, heat monitors are placed 1m away from the door to assess how much heat is transferred from the door into the surrounding area during a fire.
The second way to test and certify a fire doors ability to prevent heat transfer is known as and Fire Insulation rating. This measures the ability of a door to reduce the conduction of heat through the actual door leaf itself. In the fire test, a number of heat monitors are placed directly onto the door leaf. The insulation rating is the time it takes for the heat monitors, on the non-fire side of the door, to reach an average of 140 degrees Celsius above their starting temperature.
So, there you have it! The 3 different types of fire rating that you’re likely to encounter on doorways:
- Integrity – For stopping flames and gasses.
- Radiation – For stopping transfer of heat through the door into the surrounding areas.
- Insulation – For stopping the transfer of heat through the door leaf itself.
Understanding fire ratings is critical for correct doorway specification. If you need help selecting fire doors for your project, reach out to the Tekta team today, we’re here to help! 😊
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