Description of BS EN 13381-9:2015 2015

This European Standard specifies a test and assessment method for determining the contribution made by fire protection systems to the fire resistance of structural steel beam I and H members in the horizontal plane containing openings in the web which may affect the structural performance of the beam. This European Standard applies to beams subject to 3 or 4 sided fire exposure.

For any beam with a single web opening or where the web openings are considered to be of small diameter in relation to the web depth the applicability of this European Standard needs to be determined by a structural engineer.

This European Standard applies to fire protection materials that have already been tested and assessed in accordance with EN 13381‑4 or EN 13381‑8 . i.e. this European Standard cannot be used in isolation. Use of this European Standard requires the multi-temperature analysis (MTA) derived from EN 13381‑4 or EN 13381‑8 as the basis for determining thickness for beams with web openings. This MTA needs to be carried out on the web and bottom flange separately generating an elemental multi-temperature analysis (EMTA). The bottom flange EMTA may be used as the top flange EMTA when a beam is subject to 4 sided exposure.

This European Standard contains the fire test methodology, which specifies the tests which need to be carried out to provide data on the thermal characteristics of the fire protection system, when exposed to the standard temperature/time curve specified in EN 1363‑1 .

This European standard also contains the assessment, which prescribes how the analysis of the test data should be made and gives guidance on the procedures which should be undertaken.

The assessment procedure is used to establish:

1. on the basis of the temperature data derived from testing unloaded steel sections, the thermal response of the fire protection system on cellular beams (the thermal performance);

2. the temperature ratio between the web post and the web reference temperature, which will vary depending on the web post width;

3. the temperature ratio between points around the web openings and the web reference area;

4. the elemental multi temperature analysis from either EN 13381‑4 or EN 13381‑8 needs to be reassessed and reported against elemental A/V for each fire resistance period;

5. a structural model needs to be used to derive limiting temperatures for cellular beams using the data from b), c) and d) above.

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