Fire Safety Science Digital Archive

The behaviour of glazing could influence the growth of fires. Radiation is often the most significant heat transfer mechanism and its modelling is critical to an accurate prediction of temperature distribution in the glass and the time to breakage. In the present study a spectral radiation model based on the Discrete Ordinates Method has been developed. The model accounts for the diffuse nature of radiation incident on the glazing and provides a better handling of the boundary conditions. For verification purposes, the model is applied to some typical fires/glazing scenarios from the literature. Good agreements are found between predictions and experimental data. The study also investigates the effects of the glass thickness, thermal conductivity and emissivity on the glass temperature. In order to predict the dynamic behaviour of the glazing in fires, the coupling of the radiation model with the CFD code FDS is explored and some preliminary results reported.