Designed by Perfido Weiskopf Wagstaff + Goettel, the resort and museum house encompasses a hearth resistive glass ground that additionally acts as a lightwell. This permits gentle to penetrate additional within the construction whereas assembly all fire-rated necessities.
Certainly, ever for the reason that introduction of ASTM E-119 rated hearth resistive glazing, designers have been utilizing it to convey gentle, openness, and magnificence to rated stairwells, elevator enclosures, exit corridors, occupancy separations and curtainwalls whereas nonetheless offering most safety in opposition to smoke, flames, and radiant warmth. As we speak, they’re bringing this expertise to rated flooring.
Though the design of fireplace resistive glass ground assemblies can differ between producers, all of them have three principal elements: a walkable floor, hearth resistive glazing, and structural beams.
The walkable floor is the top-most layer that’s uncovered to foot site visitors, furnishings, or different objects occupying the ground. If utilized in exterior functions, it might be uncovered to UV rays, rain, or snow as properly. Due to this, heat-strengthened or tempered laminated glass are usually used for power and sturdiness. Since glass’s onerous, clean floor poses a slipping hazard to pedestrians, anti-slip surfaces or abrasive ceramic frits are added for traction. Ornamental parts or various levels of opacity may also be added for privateness whereas nonetheless permitting gentle to go by means of.
Fireplace resistive glazing that meets ASTM E-119 permits the ground meeting for use in hearth limitations (IBC Part 707) and fire-resistance-rated horizontal assemblies (IBC Part 711).
The structural beams type a assist grid that holds the meeting in place. Metal is usually used to attain the extent of power wanted assist dwell, lifeless, seismic, and wind masses. The structural beams should even have the identical hearth score as the hearth resistive glazing used within the ground meeting.
The three elements above, along with sealants and different supplies comprising the hearth resistive ground system, are examined as an meeting in a nationally acknowledged, impartial testing laboratory. The meeting is secured to a big scale horizontal furnace and thermocouples are positioned on the non-fire facet to measure the quantity of radiant warmth passing by means of the meeting. The furnace follows the ASTM E-119 time-temperature curve and a load (usually 100 psf) is utilized to the meeting for your entire length of the take a look at. If the meeting stays intact and limits the temperature rise to lower than 250 F above ambient on the non-fire facet (regardless of temperatures within the furnace reaching 1,800 F and the continual load all through the take a look at), the meeting passes. As we speak, hearth resistive ground assemblies can be found with scores as much as two hours, together with SAFTI FIRST’s GPX FireFloor System.
This rigorous take a look at ensures that fireside resistive ground techniques can present occupants with a protected and dependable technique of egress as they exit the constructing within the occasion of a fireplace.