Photos
Pictures from the fire lab:
CSSCI Combustion Art Competition
6th U.S. National Combustion Conference, May 17-20, 2009
Second Place (tie) “The Devil’s in the Small-Scale Details”
The research around the picture involves predicting the flame spread on warehouse fires using small-scale cone calorimeter data. The image shows a test performed on the cone calorimeter in which 2 cardboard cells are set up and free burned to better understand the burning characteristics of a larger packed commodity box. The outer shell of the box is corrugated cardboard and the fuel inside consists of polystyrene cups. The image shows the polystyrene burning after the front face of cardboard has burned away. The mass loss rate from the tests is then used to predict flame spread on large 30-40 foot stacks of boxes stored in warehouses.
Laminar flame spread on corrugated cardboard
2-cell cardboard box setup in cone calorimeter
Preliminary corrugated cardboard flame spread tests in cone calorimeter
Polystyrene cup classification test in cone calorimeter – liquid pool fire
Todd H. (left) and me (right) after an intermediate-scale box test in the WPI fire science lab
