An idealized temperature curve of compartment fire has three, distinct
phases: growth phase, steady-burning (or fully developed) phase, and decay
phase. Standard temperature-time curves are not suitable for describing the
fire phenomena because it does not take into account fire load nor
ventilation conditions, and fire according to these curves never decays. The
temperature curve of compartment fire, especially the growth phase, may be
treated like pulse phenomena. This means that it is possible to approximate
the fire development with some suitable function that satisfactory describes
the pulse phenomena. The shape of the time-temperature curve for fire with
flashover has characteristic peak before the decay phase, or slow decreases
before the decay phase - in absence of flashover. In this paper we propose
the definition of the time-temperature curve by means of a unique function in
which the quantities of fuel and ventilation conditions are defined with
parameters. This function is very convenient for approximation of the
development of compartment fire with flashover, for smouldering combustion
which has fire curve without characteristic peak, this function can be used
only for approximation of growth period of fire.
Effect of ignition heat source on design fire curve of polyethylene foam in a compartment fire
