Smoke Detector Response to Nuisance Aerosols.
Smoke Detector Response to Nuisance Aerosols.
(221 K)
Cleary, T. G.; Grosshandler, W. L.; Chernovsky, A.
International Conference on Automatic Fire Detection
"AUBE '99", 11th. Proceedings. University of Duisburg.
[Internationale Konferenz uber Automatischen
Brandentdeckung.] March 16-18, 1999, Duisburg, Germany,
Luck, H., Editor(s), 42-51 pp, 1999.
Keywords:
fire detection; fire detection systems; smoke detectors;
test methods; aerosols; data analysis
Abstract:
The worth of a fire detector is determined as much by
its ability not to respond to stimuli that are generated
from non-threatening sources as to respond in a timely
manner to an actual fire. Photo-electric and ionization
smoke detectors react to a greater or lesser degree to
all particles that enter the sensing chamber, and, by
themselves, the detectors can not distinguish smoke from
a nuisance aerosol. The fire-emulator/detector-evaluator
(FE/DE) is used to produce smoke and nuisance aerosols
representative of what could be present immediately
adjacent to an installed detector, and provides a test
bed to determine the response of spot-type detectors to
physical products (temperature, gases, and smoke) formed
in simulated fires, as well as the response to stimuli
not associated with a fire threat. The analog output of
a multi-sensor detector is measured as a function of
aerosol type (peanut oil and clay dust), concentration,
and air flow, and is compared to the response of the
detector to a flaming fire, and to the extinction of
laser light in the FE/DE test section at optical
densities up to 0.12 m-1.
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Gaithersburg, MD 20899