Modeling Study of the Behavior of Liquid Fire Suppression Agents in a Simulated Engine Nacelle.
Modeling Study of the Behavior of Liquid Fire
Suppression Agents in a Simulated Engine Nacelle.
(306 K)
Fleming, J. W.; Yang, J. C.
Halon Options Technical Working Conference, 14th.
Proceedings. HOTWC 2004. Sponsored by: 3M Specialty
Materials, Boeing, Chemical Development Studies, Inc.,
DuPont Fire Extinguishants, Halon Alternative Research
Corp., Hughes Associates, Inc., Kidde-Fenwal, Inc.,
Sandia National Laboratories, SEVO Systems, Next
Generation Fire Suppression Technology Program. May
4-6, 2004, Albuquerque, NM, 1-10 pp, 2004.
Keywords:
halon alternatives; halons; fire suppression; nacelle
engines; fire behavior; liquid fires; vaporization;
evaporation; computational fluid dynamics; fire
protection
Abstract:
This paper is a status report for a modeling study to
evaluate the fire suppression potential for compounds in
protecting engine nacelles. The project, "Vapor Loading
and Suppression Effectiveness of Two-Phase Fire
Suppressant", is part of the Strategic Environmental
Research and Development Program (SERDP) funded DoD Next
Generation Fire Protection Technology Program (NGP).
The project seeks to assess the vapor concentration
bounding conditions for condensed gases/liquids
considering their physical properties and the intended
application conditions. There is a high probability
that gases or liquids with high boiling points, likely
higher than that of Halon 1301, will be required to
provide fire protection in engine nacelles. For this
application, agents will need to be effective both at
normal air temperatures near 300 K and also at low
temperatures present at high altitude. In such a cold,
non-trivial flow environment, the performance of the
suppression agent will depend on a number of parameters
including physical properties of the agent (heat
capacity, boiling point, and heat of vaporization), the
application temperature, and the flow-imposed time
constraints for liquid agent evaporation. There is a
need to eliminate compounds from consideration that will
never be suitable and to identify those favorable
properties that the successful agents are likely to
possess. It is expected that the pre-qualified list
will then undergo further scrutiny, including detailed
modeling and experimental investigation. In this study,
transport and evaporation of drops introduced into a
simulated engine nacelle are treated using the NIST Fire
Dynamics Simulator (FDS) version 3.
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Gaithersburg, MD 20899