| Reaction to Fire |
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The purpose of Reaction to fire testing is to determine whether a material fuels a fire. The EU Reaction to fire evaluation criteria are the material's ignitability, rate of heat release, rate of spread of flame, rate of smoke production, toxic gases, flaming droplets/particles and/or a combination of these safety aspects. These characteristics are measured with a system of only four harmonised, small-scale test methods plus a large-scale reference test protocol.
Seven Euro-classes
All building materials (except flooring and roofing materials) will be ranked in one of seven Euro-classes. |
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| Rockwool stone wool will be classified in the best/safest of the seven Euro-classes: A1 |
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Most of the foamed plastic insulation materials on the market will be classified in the more hazardous groups D and E. In many countries, the new EU reaction to fire standards will give a more realistic classification of materials' reaction to fire than today. For example in the UK.
If other components (for instance paint, glue, a plasterboard) are added to a basic material, an extra test will be necessary to determine the Euro-class of the total composite system.
To see the official ranking of the building materials tested in the EU inter-laboratory round robin pretest click here. |
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Smoke
It is smoke that kills more than 2/3 of all fire victims. Products in Euroclasses A2 to D that give off little or no smoke will be classified S1, products with medium dense smoke S2, whereas materials emitting much smoke - thus making escape difficult - will be classified S3. This safety information is a clear improvement since most EU countries do not classify for smoke today.
Burning particles and droplets
Burning particles or droplets may inflict skin burns and can cause further spread of fire. Products in Euro-classes A2 to D that give off no burning particles/droplets will be classified D0. If particles/droplets burn for less than 10 seconds the product will be classified D1. If more than 10 seconds D2.
Reference scenario
The Commission has decided that the reference scenario is a large scale-test method which is based upon the well known test ISO 9705: 'Full scale room test'. The European version of the ISO test will define the borders between the Euro-classes. Further it will be able to test building products which cannot be tested in the small-scale tests and products which give a misleading result in the small-scale methods. The reference test can also be considered a 'referee' if some products are 'engineered' to meet the requirements in the small-scale tests. The test is commonly considered as reflecting a real fire in a compartment.
Click here to see the video about the new reaction to fire Euro-classes |
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