BLOG
|
11.03.2019

Planning fire safety and personal safety

To guarantee a high level of personal safety in the event of fire, any overall planning concept needs to address smoke prevention and smoke reduction.

This means that building systems and individual building elements used in a building should not only avoid making the fire worse, they should also produce as little smoke as possible. The fire resistance rating of building components (e.g. the composition of piping systems) also plays a significant role. When it comes to selecting and assembling the building materials used, decision makers such as planners and installers have a great deal of responsibility in this regard.

Smoke-free saves lives

In the event of a fire, plastics release smoke and noxious gases. Both of these are a greater risk to people in buildings than heat and flames: Burns themselves rarely claim victims in a fire. The biggest culprit is the smoke, which disguises escape routes and which can be fatally toxic.

That’s why the team at Kaimann have made our flexible insulation materials smoke-free: Kaiflex KKplus s1/s2 produce only low/limited smoke in the event of a fire (see video). This keeps escape routes very safe and significantly shortens evacuation times. Our standard product, Kaiflex KKplus s2, already takes safety beyond basic legal construction requirements and the current tender standard. The European neighbour states have already recognised the need for greater personal safety and are implementing mandatory fire or building regulations that restrict smoke development with their requirement of a minimum “s2” specification for plastics. As well as our cold pipe supports and special adhesives, Kaiflex KKplus s1 offers a complete system in the most achievable building material class for foam plastics, B-s1, d0. With smoke formation classes s1 (“low smoke development”) and s2 (“limited smoke development”), the insulation materials meet the highest European requirements for smoke and provide at least 90 minutes of fire resistance in accordance with DIN 4102-11 and EN 1366 for a variety of pipe opening solutions.

Kaimann makes it easier to achieve your fire safety target for technical insulation and saves you time and money too. This is because you do not need to change materials for building component isolation in pipe systems. With us, you get all your materials from one source, including accessories such as pipe supports and adhesives. In addition to this, with an outside pipe diameter of up to 133 mm for steel and 42 mm for copper, no additional fire protection mat is needed when using Kaiflex KKplus s1 or Kaiflex KKplus s2 through solid components.

Isolation at a crucial point

Blog_Brand_Personenschutz_ImageContent

These days, air ducts and piping must be insulated as a rule. The reasons for this include minimising energy loss and meeting legal requirements. Of course, it is sensible, and permissible from a fire safety perspective, to continue the insulation through walls and ceilings in order to ensure continuous heat or cold insulation and to avoid moisture condensation in the breach. In this case, however, the insulation material needs to ensure that fire, smoke and gases do not spread to neighbouring compartments in the event of a fire. It is also essential to prevent secondary fires being caused by high temperatures on the side facing away from the fire. The insulation material needs to act as a fire barrier and a fire barrier has to achieve one thing: that a fire in a room, as well as the heat, smoke and gases it produces, remains in that room. There are standards which determine the time span in which no heat and/or smoke may penetrate the barrier.

In Germany, these time spans are separated into fire resistance classes (DIN 4102-2). These classes indicate the time in minutes for which the insulation can withstand direct confrontation with the fire without losing its structure and function. In terms of insulation material classification, the R90 Classification (90 minutes) is considered the most common standard worldwide. Why? In many countries, 90 minutes is considered the time required to fully evacuate open and extensive buildings (e.g. warehouses, shopping centres).

Despite being flame retardant, Kaiflex KKplus (s3/s2/s1) insulation materials are particularly well suited for pipe openings with 90/120 minutes’ fire resistance. It is possible to adhere to the DIN 4102-2 requirements for R90 and, in part, even R120 openings without needing to change material. For larger pipe diameters, where the pipe is laid through lightweight partition walls or for isolating combustible pipe systems, the "Kaiflex Pyrostar" fire wrap system can also be used. The intumescent matting expands under thermal stress of 200-300 °C to tightly shut the pipe openings. With Kaiflex KKplus s1 sheet material, Kaimann offers a sheet material made of FEF (flexible elastomeric foam) which actively protects against fire thanks to its INCERAM coating. When subjected to flames, the surface expands and encapsulates the flame-retardant insulating layer as well as everything inside or below to protect against fire.