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Assessment of A Model Development For Window Glass Breakage Due To Fire
Assessment of A Model Development For Window Glass Breakage Due To Fire
a r t i c l e in fo
abstract
Article history:
Received 1 August 2008
Received in revised form
27 August 2008
Accepted 5 September 2008
Available online 15 October 2008
This paper presents a model development for the prediction of window glass breakage and fallout in a
eld model. Glass breakage is based on the temperature difference and the allowable glass breaking
stress; and glass fallout is determined by a preset number of successive breakages. As a validation,
generally good agreements are obtained between the numerical predictions and the data from a
compartment re experiment. The predicted glass surface temperature and the adjacent gas
temperature are within 1025% of the test data. For re sizes of 170, 280 and 390 kW, the time of
initial occurrence of glass breakage are shown within reasonable range of the experimental results. For
the 680 kW re case, the model shows an earlier glass fallout time, however, the predicted glass
temperature at fallout is around 450 1C and is consistent with previous experiments. Further research
to improve the model is discussed such as on radiation modeling and the criteria of glass breakage
and fallout.
& 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Glass breakage
CFD
Compartment re
1. Introduction
In a built environment, window glass breaking during a re
poses potential danger to occupants safe evacuation, and
challenges re ghting activities and the protection of structural
integrity. As window glass breakage and fallout create additional
vent openings, this essentially increases air and oxygen supply to
the re inside the enclosure, causing such phenomenon as back
draft [1]. For a ventilation-controlled re, the result would be a
sudden jump in heat release rate and a rapid spread of re when
fuel vapor mixes with incoming oxygen at the right temperature.
The research work on glass breakage due to re started with
the experiments in Harvard University [2]. The theoretical
analyses by [3,4] suggested the temperature difference as the
cause of glass breakage (crack) and subsequent fallout. Joshi and
Pagni [5] derived an analytical model for glass breakage, the
BREAK1 algorithm [6]. They also quantied through experiments
that the glass breaking stress follows a Weibull distribution. This
analytical model was later extended to double panes [7]. In the
mean time, the experiments by Skelly et al. [8] demonstrated the
effects of window assembly on glass breakage during a controlled
compartment re. They tested both framed (edge protected) and
unframed (edge unprotected) glass and the results showed that
the unframed glass could sustain a higher temperature increase
than what the framed glass does. Another study by Strege et al. [9]
examined re induced failure of polycarbonate windows. In a
recent experiment [10], the performance of multi-pane glazing
due to radiant heat ux has been tested at small, medium and
large-scale samples, and the radiant transmittance through the
glazing assembly was examined.
Along with experiments and theoretical analyses, numerical
modeling of glass breakage has been explored extensively for both
zone models and eld models. Sincaglia and Barnett [11]
presented a study on the implementation of BREAK1 glass
breakage model into a zone model. They paid special attention
to the dependence of radiative heat absorption coefcient on
wavelength, using a three-band radiation model. Parry et al. [12]
veried the three-band radiation model for the zone model
BRANZFIRE. This was largely based on the radiative heat transfer
model of [11] and the glass failure criterion of [5]. The latest
development in numerical modeling of glass breakage is by [13].
They used the glass failure temperature to determine the time
of window fallout and assumed that this failure temperature
follows a Gaussian probability distribution. The other study [14]
discussed the use of advanced radiation modeling in the
prediction of glass breakage.
One of the observations by [5] and many others is that in a re
environment, a uniform approximation to glass temperature
distribution with depth would not be valid. This is due to the
presence of the large temperature difference between the inner
and the outer surface. Therefore, the thickness of the glass should
be taken into account. It should also be noted that the interaction
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Nomenclature
t
x
b
E
T
h
C
cp
L
l
I
Re
Pr
q
S
dimensionless factor
coefcient of thermal expansion (1/1C)
Youngs modulus (Pa)
temperature (K)
coefcient of convective heat transfer (w/m2 K)
constant
specic heat (kJ/kg K)
local characteristic length scale (m)
radiative decay length in glass (1/m)
incident radiative heat ux (W/m)
Reynolds number
Prandtl number
total heat ux (W/m2)
glass pane thickness (m)
r
e
s
Subscript
a
c
f
g
d
between re development and enclosure connement is important, especially when window glass breakage could promote the
re. Otherwise, an iterative approach would have to be taken, and
this might be impossible for a re in an enclosed environment
that has many windows of different geometric and material
congurations. Therefore, the prediction of either the glazing
behavior or the re development necessitates both be modeled
together. Using the re dynamics simulator (FDS), the objective of
this study is to integrate the predictive capability of window glass
breakage with re modeling. In this paper, the model development is rst described and a validation study with data from a
compartment re experiment [15] is discussed.
s f bEDT
time (second)
coordinate
difference
density (kg/m3)
surface emissivity
StefanBoltzmann constant (5.67 108 J/m2/s/K4)
(1)
non-re side
convective
re side
glass
solid boundary
k
qT
ha T a t TS; t a sT 4a t sT 4 S; t qS; t
qx xS
(5)
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K. Kang / Fire Safety Journal 44 (2009) 415424
addition, the following modications and functions were implemented as part of the glass breakage and fallout algorithm:
2400
2400
2000
400
417
4. Results
360
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3600
844
PANE 3
2400
1895
422
844
PANE 1
844
422
844
PANE 2
422
422
Fig. 2. Arrangement of windows and measurement locations of thermocouples (A to Q) and ux meters (1 to 6) [15,17].
300
140
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
160
250
200
150
100
50
0
10
15
25
20
Time (min)
30
35
40
450
800
400
700
Heat Release Rate (kW)
180
350
300
250
200
150
100
10
15
25
20
Time (min)
30
40
35
600
500
400
300
200
100
50
0
0
10
15
20
Time (min)
25
30
8 10 12
Time (min)
14
16
18
20
Fig. 3. Fire heat release rate as a function of time [15] for (a) 600 mm pan (170 kW); (b) 700 mm pan (280 kW); (c) 800 mm pan (390 kW) and (d) 900 mm pan (680 kW).
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K. Kang / Fire Safety Journal 44 (2009) 415424
250
250
Location of Crack
Pane Center
200
419
150
100
50
Location of Crack
Pane Center
200
150
100
50
0
0
50
150
200
100
Experimental Measurements (deg-C)
250
50
100
150
200
Experimental Measurements (deg-C)
250
350
Location of Crack
Pane Center
Location of Crack
Pane Center
350
FDS Predictions (deg-C)
300
250
200
150
100
50
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
0
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
Fig. 4. Comparison of glass surface temperature between numerical and experimental results; shown with 710% and 725% reference lines for (a) 600 mm pan (170 kW);
(b) 700 mm pan (280 kW); (c) 800 mm pan (390 kW); and (d) 900 mm pan re (680 kW).
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420
250
Location of Crack
Pane Center
200
250
150
100
50
150
100
50
0
0
50
100
150
200
250
Experimental Measurements (deg-C)
350
300
200
50
100
150
Experimental measurements (deg-C)
250
400
Location of Crack
Pane Center
Location of Crack
Pane Center
200
250
200
150
100
50
0
Location of Crack
Pane Center
350
300
250
200
150
100
50
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
Fig. 5. Comparison of glass surface temperature between numerical and experimental results; shown with 710% and 725% reference lines for: (a) 600 mm pan (170 kW);
(b) 700 mm pan (280 kW); (c) 800 mm pan (390 kW); and (d) 900 mm pan re (680 kW).
350
Gas Temperature A
Gas Temperature K
Gas Temperature M
300
Temperature (C)
Gas Temperature C
Gas Temperature L
Gas Temperature N
250
A
N
C
200
150
100
K
M
L
50
0
0
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Time (min)
Fig. 6. Enclosure local gas temperature history at selected locations for 600 mm
pan re.
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K. Kang / Fire Safety Journal 44 (2009) 415424
350
700
Glass Temperature A
Glass Temperature K
Glass Temperature L
Glass Temperature M
Glass Temperature N
Glass Temperature C
Glass Temperature A
600
250
A
N
C
200
150
100
M
K
L
50
Glass Temperature M
Temperature (C)
Temperature (C)
300
500
Glass Temperature N
A
N
C
400
Glass Temperature L
Glass Temperature C
Glass Temperature K
300
200
K
M
100
0
0
10
15
20
25
Time (min)
30
35
40
Fig. 7. Exposed local glass temperature history at selected locations for 600 mm
pan re.
Gas Temperature N
Gas Temperature M
Gas Temperature L
Gas Temperature C
400
Gas Temperature K
300
200
K
M
100
8
10
Time (min)
12
14
16
18
Heat Flux #1
Heat Flux #2
Heat Flux #3
Heat Flux #4
Heat Flux #5
Heat Flux #6
5
Heat Flux (kW/m2)
500
Gas Temperature A
600
Fig. 9. Exposed local glass temperature history at selected locations for 900 mm
pan re.
700
Temperature (C)
421
5
2
1
3
4
3
6
4
2
1
0
0
8
10
12
Time (min)
14
16
18
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Time (min)
Fig. 8. Enclosure local gas temperature history at selected locations for 900 mm
pan re.
Fig. 10. History of predicted gauge heat ux for 600 mm pan re.
pan re, the heat ux at all the locations except #5 converges after
the window fallout. Of all the locations, #4 and #6 consistently
have the lowest heat ux, which is the same as the experiment.
The location of the highest heat ux is, however, different from
the experiment, for example, the model result indicates location
#5 instead of #3 for the 600 mm pan re. The peak heat ux as
calculated is approximately 4.5 and 20 kW/m2, respectively.
In comparison, the experimental results showed the peak heat
ux as 10 and 50 kW/m2. This is probably because of the nite
spatial discretization used by the radiation model and the size
of the measuring point, which might have missed the point
evaluation.
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6. Discussions
In this paper, a model to predict glass breakage and fallout due
to re exposure was developed within the FDS program. The
criteria of glass breakage [5] and window fallout [16] are
implemented, and the modication of FDS took into account
one-dimensional heat conduction and radiative decay through the
glass. As a validation exercise, the numerical results are compared
to the experimental data of a compartment re by [15] and four
cases are examined with peak re HRRs of 170, 280, 390 and
680 kW. In general, good agreement with the experiment has been
obtained: Quantitatively, the predicted glass surface temperatures
25
20
Heat Flux #1
Heat Flux #2
Heat Flux #3
Heat Flux #4
Heat Flux #5
Heat Flux #6
2
3
1
5
15
10
Table 1
Comparison of time of more than 50% window glass fallout
6
4
Experiment [15]
0
2
8
10
Time (min)
12
14
16
18
Model w/glass
breakage
a
Fig. 11. History of predicted gauge heat ux for 900 mm pan re.
900
Peak re HRR
(kW)a
Time
(s)
Window pane
no.
800 800
800 800
900 900
900 900
900 900
900 900
900 900
900 900
390
390
680
680
680
680
680
680
336
726
398
650
450
505
232
259
3
3
1
1
3
3
3
1
Time based on more than 50% of the glass fallout in the experiments.
500
1000
Experiments
FDS
800
700
600
500
400
300
Experiments
FDS
450
400
350
300
250
200
200
0
2
3
Sequence of Crack
300
2
3
Sequence of Crack
160
Experiments
FDS
250
Pan size
(mm mm)
200
150
100
Experiments
FDS
140
120
100
80
60
50
0
2
3
Sequence of Crack
2
3
Sequence of Crack
Fig. 12. Comparison of the rst three occurrence of glass breakage between numerical and experimental results; for (a) 600 mm pan (170 kW); (b) 700 mm pan (280 kW);
(c) 800 mm pan (390 kW); and (d) 900 mm pan re (680 kW).
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K. Kang / Fire Safety Journal 44 (2009) 415424
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Currently, the model is being ported into the latest version of FDS
and it is expected that the model will eventually be developed
more as an add-on module. For either probabilistic or
deterministic approaches, further studies also need to be undertaken for model validation.
7. Conclusion
This paper describes a model development for window glass
breakage and fallout predictions in FDS. A specic object type was
developed for window glass and the associated heat transfer was
modeled to determine glass breakage that is similar to the
BREAK1 algorithm. The glass fallout is based on an assumed
number of three breakages. For model validation, the gas and the
glass temperature, and the heat ux in a compartment center re
are compared between the numerical and the experimental
results. Four cases are studied with different pan size of 600,
700, 800 and 900 mm, corresponding to the peak re size of 170,
280, 390 and 680 kW, respectively. In general, good agreements
have been demonstrated quantitatively and qualitatively. At
discrete monitoring locations around the window glass, the
predicted glass surface temperature and the adjacent gas
temperature are shown typically within 1025%, with the
discrepancy increasing slightly as the heat release rate increases.
The time histories of the gas and the glass surface temperature at
selected monitoring locations are compared well with the
experiment. It is shown that the rst three occurrences of glass
breakage are within reasonable ranges of the experimental
observation. The discrepancy in the predicted heat ux, especially
for the 680 kW case, may be a numerical issue; however, together
with the earlier predicted glass fallout would need further
research. The glass temperature at window fallout is around
450500 1C and is consistent with previous tests. Given the
uncertainty in the glass material properties and hence the
breaking criterion, detailed information on the performance of
window glass when exposed to re would be needed to improve
the model predictive capabilities. Currently this model is
being transferred to the latest version of FDS and developed as
an add-on module, with further validation and sensitivity
studies being undertaken.
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