Fire Protective Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete Plates for Steel Structures under Different Types of Fire Exposure

In a situation where a fire occurs either in a tunnel with a burning vehicle carrying petroleum products, at an offshore platform, or at an oil and gas asset to be protected, such a case is commonly described using a hydrocarbon fire curve. Therefore, it is extremely important to design construction, which can maintain stability and bearing capacity both under the standard and hydrocarbon fire modes. The purpose in this work is to hold a behavior simulation of a steel structure with fireproofing ensured through lightweight concrete slabs reinforced with fiber glass as well as a validation of the outcomes by assessing the experimental findings obtained from the relevant fire tests. A fire resistance study was carried out here for steel structures with a profile ratio of 156 mm−1 for the cases of a standard fire and of a hydrocarbon fire. A constant static load of 687 kN (70 tf) was taken for standard fire and 294 kN (30 tf) for hydrocarbon fire; the column was under vertical compression with one end resting on a hinged support and the other end rigidly fixed. The specimen design incorporated single-layer box-section cladding made of Pyro-Safe Aestuver T slabs, 40 mm thick and of a 650 kg/m³ density, pre-cut to fit the column size. The column strength loss (R) ultimately occurred after 240 min in the standard fire case and after 180 min in the hydrocarbon fire case. As the breach in the fireproofing structural integrity (E) or the installation accuracy cannot be considered, the limit state indicators may show certain discrepancies. According to the simulation performed using SOFiSTiK software, the design fire resistance rating of the structure in a hydrocarbon fire case was 58% higher than the figure obtained by holding fire tests due to the slabs cracking during the experiment session; the discrepancy between the outcomes of the session and the simulation in a standard fire case was as much as 15%.

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