A simple method to predict temperatures in steel joints with partial intumescent coating fire protection

Based on temperatures measured in steel joints with different extents of fire protection, this paper proposes a simple method to calculate temperatures in steel joints with partial intumescent coating fire protection. The method combines the simple temperature calculation methods in EN 1993-1-2 (Committee of European Normalisation CEN, Eurocode 3: design of steel structures-part 1-2: general rules-structural fire design, 2005) for unprotected and protected steel structures through the introduction of an exposure factor, which is the ratio of the unprotected surface area of the joint region to the total surface area of the joint area. Using the measured temperatures for fully protected steel joints, this paper first extracts the effective thermal conductivity of the intumescent coating used in the fire tests. Afterwards, this paper presents validation results based on fire test results on joints with partial fire protection. Finally, this paper presents methods to calculate the exposure factor for different types of partially fire protected steel joints. © 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.