title: Experimental study on flowing burning behaviors of a pool fire with dripping of melted thermoplastics.
abstract: The objective of this work is to quantitatively investigate the dripping-burning and flowing fire of thermoplastics. A new experimental setup is developed with a heating vessel and a T-trough. Hot thermoplastic liquids are generated in the vessel by electric heating. N2 gas is continuously injected into the vessel to avoid a sudden ignition of fuel in it. The detailed flowing burning behaviors of pool fire in the T-trough are analyzed through the measurements of the mass, heat flux and temperatures etc. The experimental results suggest that a continuous dripping of melted thermoplastic liquids in a nearly constant mass rate can be successfully made in the new setup. It also shows that the mass dripping rate of melted PS liquid is smaller than PP and PE since its large viscosity. In addition, the flame spread velocities of hot liquids of PS in the T-trough are also smaller than that of PP and PE because of its large viscosity. The mass burning rate of the PP and PE pool fire in T-trough are smaller than PS. Finally, considering the heating, melting, dripping and flowing burning behaviors of these polymers, it is suggested that the fire hazard of PE and PP are obviously higher than PS for their faster flowing burning.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027PR China. Electronic address: xqy@ustc.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Qiyuan
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027PR China.
authors.forename: Ran
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Tu
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027PR China.
authors.forename: Nan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027PR China.
authors.forename: Xin
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Ma
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Fire Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230027PR China.
authors.forename: Xi
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Jiang
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D005390:Fires; D005615:Freezing; D006358:Hot Temperature; D055595:Mechanical Phenomena; D010969:Plastics / Q000737:chemistry*; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry; D011137:Polystyrenes / Q000737:chemistry; D013816:Thermodynamics
chemical_list: D010969:Plastics; D011108:Polymers; D011137:Polystyrenes
keywords: Dripping; Flowing; Melting; Pool fire; Thermoplastics