Fire-rated cellular beams

FABSEC’s primary product is FIREBEAM which has been developed over the last three years to provide an optimised solution of fabricated steel section combined with thin intumescent coating. FIREBEAM’s can be designed with a fire resistance period from 30-120 minutes.

FIREBEAM has been tested exhaustively at Warrington Fire Research Station in a two year programme of loaded, coated, composite fire tests. This programme was supervised by the Steel Construction Institute and the consequential mathematical model was incorporated into FABSEC’s unique FBEAM software.

Full details of the fire test programme are available upon request.

FIREBEAM and WFRC Fire Tests

The FBEAM 2006 software permits engineers to design highly efficient FIREBEAMS with a fire rating of 30-120 minutes. These may be confidently designed and specified by engineers in the full knowledge of a comprehensive 2 year test programme at Warrington Fire Research Centre which included 7 loaded, coated, composite fire tests in the Warrington furnace. During these tests temperature measurements were taken over time at numerous thermocouple positions in beams with a variety of cross sections and web openings.

Fire Design – Instrumentation
Thermocouple Positions

The intumescent paint for FIREBEAM is provided by Leigh’s Paints (a FABSEC shareholder). The product used is FIRETEX FB120, a unique and innovative product that it has been especially formulated and tested for use in FIREBEAM. The application of the coating is undertaken in (selected) factory locations off-site. This takes a wet trade off-site and ensures a high level of quality control for the application.

Stages of the fire testing:
Beams Have Been Coated With Intumescent Paint And Are Ready For fire Testing
Swelling of Paint During Fire Testing
Failure Modes Caused by Prolonged Fire (Coating has been removed for investigation of failure mode)