- Author
- Emmons, H. W.
- Title
- Vent Flows.
- Coporate
- Harvard Univ., Cambridge, MA
- Sponsor
- National Bureau of Standards, Gaithersburg, MD
- Report
- Home Fire Proj. Tech. Rpt. 70, June 1985, 32 p.
- Keywords
- vents | buoyant flow | fire measurements
- Abstract
- Fire releases a great deal of heat which causes the heated gas to expand. The expansion produced by a fire in a room drives some of the gas out of the room. Any opening through which gas can flow out of the fire room is a vent. The obvious vents are open doors and windows. Ventilation ducts also provide important routes for gas release. A room in an average building may have all of its doors and windows closed. If ventilation ducts are also closed, the gas will leak around normal closed doors and windows and through any holes made for pipes or wires. These will act as vents. (If a room were hermetically sealed a relatively small fire would raise the pressure in the room and burst the window, door, or walls.)