Steel Plus fire

peteweaver

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peteweaver
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Mar 1, 2007
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The website:

http://www.wtc7.net/buildingfires.html

Tries to use fire tests carried out on behalf of british steel to try and make a case against the collapse of the WTC.

They misrepresent the data of the cardington fire tests by ommitting practically all data from them, and concentrating on the one fact that the cardington test rig did not collapse as a result of fire.

Several facts they ommit are as follows:
Trusses buckled and failed due to the heat.
Intact Composite floor slabs added their own tensile strength and compensated for the failed floor trusses preventing collapse.

All the data from the cardington fire tests can be found here:

http://www.mace.manchester.ac.uk/pr...ures/strucfire/DataBase/TestData/default1.htm

The page on corus's website
http://www.corusconstruction.com/en...re/cardington_fire_test/cardington_fire_test/

Shows photographs from a test office fire that clearly show that the test office fire had been hot enough to cause structural warping.
 
The risk which fire poses to steelwork (or iron, as the case may be) has been recognised since the days of Louis Sullivan in Chicago. Depending upon circumstances the fire resistance of unprotected steel in a "normal" fire can be as little as 30 minutes. For this reason every single set of building regulations which I am aware of require varying standards of fire resistance, from a normal minimum of 2 hours right up to 4 or more.

Inasmuch as these regulations are backed up by a wide range of tests from British Steel and others for over 50 years, and likewise the manufacturers of fireproofing, I am at a loss as to why the Truth movement continue to cling to such a blatant falsehood as the suggestion that steel is essentially fireproof.

Nowt as blind as them who will not see, true enough.


ETA; I once did a massive post with links to the various regulations and to a lesser extent the tests. If they're particularly important to anyone, then do let me know.
 
peteweaver said:
The website:

http://www.wtc7.net/buildingfires.html

Tries to use fire tests carried out on behalf of british steel to try and make a case against the collapse of the WTC.

They misrepresent the data of the cardington fire tests by ommitting practically all data from them, and concentrating on the one fact that the cardington test rig did not collapse as a result of fire.

Several facts they ommit are as follows:
Trusses buckled and failed due to the heat.
Intact Composite floor slabs added their own tensile strength and compensated for the failed floor trusses preventing collapse.

All the data from the cardington fire tests can be found here:

http://www.mace.manchester.ac.uk/pr...ures/strucfire/DataBase/TestData/default1.htm

The page on corus's website
http://www.corusconstruction.com/en...re/cardington_fire_test/cardington_fire_test/

Shows photographs from a test office fire that clearly show that the test office fire had been hot enough to cause structural warping.
Click to expand...

A couple of posts I made before. (I have not edited them, so there may be some irrelevances.)

Dave_46 said:
I was working in the Cardington laboratory for part of the time these tests were done, and was present at at least one of them. The construction of the building was different from the WTC towers. The steel beams were substantial, not trusses as used in the WTC. The fire load was timber cribs. The steel beams, while not actually collapsing, were severely damaged, and access to the damaged area had to be restricted for safety reasons after the test.

A statement of the blindingly obvious - the structure of the Cardington building had not been compromised by being hit by an aircraft.

I note that in the material you quote the building is referred to as a "simulated, eight-story [sic] building". It wasn't "simulated", it was a full size eight storey building.

Dave
Click to expand...

and

Post 796 in the Loose Change thread.

"Folks

I was reading some older posts and came across a reference to a web site by Alek.
http://www.uscrusade.com/forum/config.pl/read/1064
this contains the following paragraph.

"In the mid-1990s British Steel and the Building Research Establishment performed a series of six experiments at Cardington to investigate the behavior of steel frame buildings. These experiments were conducted in a simulated, eight-story building. Secondary steel beams were not protected. Despite the temperature of the steel beams reaching 800-900° C (1,500-1,700° F) in three of the tests (well above the traditionally assumed critical temperature of 600° C (1,100° F), no collapse was observed in any of the six experiments."

Quote from the FEMA report (Appendix A).



Two things come to mind immediately.

1 The steel temperature is quoted at 800-900 C, when in post 601 Alek says

"In other words, look to the fires, for which I've already offered evidence that they should have been no higher than 280C (536F). They offer no scientific analysis of their vastly higher estimates. This is a big problem."

The fires in the Cardington experiments were fuelled by timber, which still managed to heat the steel to a temperature which cut its strength considerably.

2 The construction of the building used for the Cardington experiments was more modern than the WTC towers. It was specifically built to test modern construction techniques. The horizontal beams in this building are more substantial than my understanding of the WTC floor supports. The reason that the Cardington building did not collapse was due to load sharing as the individual components weakened and distorted. The building suffered severe local damage, and access to parts of the building was restricted after the tests due to the damage. To state the obvious, the structural integrity of the building had not been compromised by a severe impact.

I was present for two of the experimental fires on the Cardington building."

Dave
 
Which minds me Dave, I promised to try and find out that BR/Tesco court case we discussed before. Leave it with me.
 
Ok beams not trusses, I should read through their data a bit more myself then :o
 
I saw a History Channel special on Sherman's march to the sea and they did a reenactment of making "Sherman Bowties" which was quite informative for what happens to steel when heated, just in a wood bonfire.

What they are if you don't know.
http://www.civilwarhome.com/bowties.htm
 
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