In many cases, standard tests are not appropriate for the assessment of fire protection products or system. As a consequence, customized tests are necessary to determine the fire behavior or the effectiveness of fire protection system.

Efectis provides a wide range of experimental facilities to evaluate fire spread, combustion properties, and fire behavior of structural elements in real fire conditions.

Our engineers help you in setting up a test protocol that will meet re required demands and specifications.

These services include:

• Combustion testing under a calorimeter hood
• Full-scale tests on existing or mock-up structures (public buildings, tunnels, multilevel parking structures, warehouses, etc.)
• Mobile furnace tests
• Fire behavior in case of natural fire
• Extinguishing tests of mobile and fixed systems

Ventilation and smoke extraction tests

Requirements in terms of comfort, safety, energy efficiency combined with the growing complexity of infrastructure require constantly evolving ventilation/smoke solutions. In conjunction with engineering design and verification studies, on-site testing is a means to assess the performance of currently installed ventilation systems.

Efectis has a dedicated team, Efectis OutLabs Ventilation (EOV), to carry out on-site tests. With its expertise about fire safety engineering on smoke exhaust systems and fire tests performing, Efectis offers a wide range of services, suitable for all types of buildings and works, which include:

• Measurement of the air flow rates and pressure differences between rooms, in ventilation ducts, at vents, at fans, etc.
• Implementation of experimental fire source for the production of hot, non-destructive and clean smoke, to visualize the movement of hot gases or to create realistic conditions for achievement of smoke tests and safety exercises;
• Measurement of the temperature, velocity and the opacity of gases, with photos and video recordings of smoke movement.

Fire resistance and concrete spalling tests

The Efectis mobile furnace MobiFire is a flexible tool designed to quantify the fire resistance of immovable concrete structures, such as existing tunnels. In the past, for such concrete structures, there was no accurate method to assess the behavior in a fire situation. The MobiFire is able to expose surfaces to all internationally recognized fire curves: such as the RWS, HCM, RABT or ISO fire curve.

MobiFire tests may be part of a larger analyses of the tunnel. Efectis can assist you from the concept phase to the right testing procedures, testing equipment, safety documentation and verification stage. We can also help you in the cost-effective design of the fire protection system that might be needed to protect the structure against fire.

Click here for the MobiFire leaflet