FireDOC Search

Author
diMarzo, M.
Title
Sparse Water Sprays in Fire Protection.
Coporate
Maryland Univ., College Park
Sponsor
National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD
Report
NIST GCR 96-687, June 1996, 252 p.
Distribution
Available from National Technical Information Service
Contract
NIST-GRANT-60NANB5D0136
Keywords
water sprays | fire protection | drop size measurements | evaporation cooling | fire research | fire suppression | solid surfaces | thermal conductivity
Abstract
A comprehensive review of the findings that punctuated ten years of research on dropwise evaporative cooling is presented. The first studies consider a single droplet evaporating on a high thermal conductivity, solid surface. The solid-liquid coupling is addressed when considering the case of a low thermal conductivity solid. A powerful, non-intrusive, infrared thermographic technique is instrumental in describing the thermal behavior of the solid surface. The applications relevant to fire suppression suggest the imput of radiant heat from above the surface instead of heat conducted through the solid. Once the single droplet behavior is fully documented experimentally and accurately modeled, the study of sparse water sprays is undertaken. A superposition model is formulated which well represents the experimental data.