Intumescent Strips

Intumescent Strips for Sealing Smoke Heat and Fire

Intumescent strips have long been part of a fire resisting construction and are one of the best passive fire and smoke seals used today in many buildings in Europe. They have become Europe’s best solution to construction companies and customers for their passive fire protection need. Available in colors either white or brown, it usually complements with cold smoke seals when fitted to the back edge, stile and head of the fire resisting door sets perfectly. For this reason, intumescent seals should always be fitted in hinges, locks and door closers.

Fireproofing Properties

These intumescent strips are proven to be very good fireproofing material for structural steels like fire exit doors as well as fire stop pillows. This material fills the gap and gives extra assurance that heat transfer is blocked all the time, a fire proof characteristic that you just can’t overlook. When carefully installed to follow standards in fire safety, you can create a fire hazard-free structure or building where lives of people and property is at stake in case of a fire.

1. Light Char - This particular fire safety material is also used because it generally slows down the transfer of heat through the light char that it produces. The light char that you can find in intumescent strips is actually its best kept secret. This is because the same light char that is produced when the strips are consumed obtains a property that is a poor heat conductor, thus making heat transfer be delayed to a certain degree. This property is enough to make it one of the best fire and smoke seals of today.

2. Hydrates - Another important fact that makes the intumescent strip good for fire proofing is that they contain hydrates. These hydrates release water vapor, eventually making the environment cooler while sealing smoke, eventually blocking it and cooling the air at the same time. It’s like leaving the ceramtubes intact in the panic bolt until you need to break them. From this process, we all know that this cooling effect in return becomes the instrument in preventing further widespread of heat reducing the chances of quick widespread of fire. This process also enhances extra protection to people by providing smooth traffic passage, sealing the heat so safety evacuation procedures may easily be undertaken. Providing a fire-resisting material for construction, the hydrates of intumescent strips become a unique reason to use them in any fire safety based construction.

Fire Safety Standards Using Intumescent Strips

According to FireSafe.Org in UK, there is a technique that has been developed to reduce the vulnerability of the edges of doors by fire, heat and smoke. This technique involves the use of preventive fire spread material. That is the intumescent strips which you only need to the edges. Remember that they have standard measurements with respect to the strip size so be sure to use the right one. Following this standard procedure always yield a result contributing to more effective fire prevention procedures so you won’t need to use the fire escape ladder due to less like that an incident will occur.

How Intumescent Strips Prevent Quick Spread of Fire

When the strip is subjected to heat, it swells and bulks up, eventually sealing gaps where it is applied and totally blocking the three basic elements that accelerate the quick spread of fire (smoke, heat and fire). Standards by fire prevention authorities reveal that it should be at least 4 mm thick and 10 mm wide to become effective for helping in the construction of doorsets that comply with safety and fire proofing standards.