Our local TV station has a series on the flammability of foam used in mattresses and furniture. For me, it makes a pretty good case for home fire sprinkers…
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The dangers of foam has become something of a cause celebre of late. This was going arounf the papers not that long ago.
While the foam is flammable, so are lots ofthings around the house. The substitutes for foam padding in furniture, and especially bedding, are no less flammable.
I peeled a layer of waterborne poly off the spray booth and touched a match to it. Don't try this at home. Now I'm worried about the kitchen cabinets I've sprayed. The terrible fire in RI has us all thinking.
"Now I'm worried about the kitchen cabinets I've sprayed."
The next time you are doing cabinets spray an extra test pannel. Then try and set it on fire.
I think that you will find that a) you don't have near as much material as you do with the overspray film, b) air can not get to the back of the film, and c) the mass of the wood will control the burn.
I'm sure you are right Bill. I was suprised at how flamable dried waterborne is. Just a touch with the flame and it burned hard and hot and long. I would not want to see a flambe' set off the cabinets.
In some article, I think that is was a Jeff Jewitt article in FWW, about setting up a spray booth for WB finsihed mentioned this problem.
That the dried material is famable and you need to clean the area up once in a while.
I couldn't agree more. It makes little sense to make the house itself absolutely fireproof, then to fill it up with posessions that burn like rocket fuel.
More than one fireman has been quoted as calling these foams 'solid form gasoline' or some variation on the theme. In addition to being highly flammable this stuff also produces highly toxic gasses and smoke when it burns. I have read that as little as one good lungful of smoke from an interior fire is toxic enough to cause an adult to loose consciousness.
When I was very young firemen were just starting to use air masks and tanks. Before then the furnishings of most houses would burn but the gasses released were not anywhere near as toxic as they are now. As homes have become filled with more and more plastics and petroleum byproducts the gases produced by a fire have become much more toxic.
These foams, artificial fiber carpets and other furnishings burn hot and produce thick, poisonous smoke and fumes, some of which are colorless. A good example of this was the MGM Grand fire in Las Vegas. The toxic and colorless gasses from the fire were forced through small gaps into occupied rooms many storied above the fire and killed people without the warning that could have been afforded by visible smoke.
The fact is that most people who die in fires die from "smoke inhalation" not burns. Not a few die without being exposed to any visible smoke.
you need to clarify your comments..
Panels made with foam, (SIPS) are more resistant to fires than regular stick building.. I have a video where they light a fire in the corner and watch it burn,, the temp on the other side of the wall never got dangerous. barely over a hundred.. . while the fire raged at something like 1500 degrees.. If you did that to a typical stick built house the walls would burn in very little time.
Yes, however your point that the contents of a house are flamable is certainly true. from the bedding to the bed everything will burn and someof it will produce very nasty smoke..
Hurray! for smoke detectors..
Frenchy -
I didn't read all the information on the web site I posted, but what I did read focused on the flexible foam in mattresses, chairs, etc. However, there were a couple of interesting links on the problems with sprayed urethane rigid foam (these came from the links to an article originally posted by Cloud Hidden). The first talks about how, under certain conditions, the foam insulation can resist burning. The second talks about the conditions where rigid foam insulation can turn into an inferno:
http://www.monolithic.com/plan_design/fire_barrier/index.html
http://www.monolithic.com/plan_design/fire_hazard/index.html
Hurray for Smoke detectors and several different good fire extinguishers. Do yourself and family a favor and get a large type dry chem extinguisher or CO2 for stove and grease fires,and a couple of 2 1/2 gallon pressurized water extinguishers.I have been a paid firefighter on a Ladder Company in busy northeast city for almost twenty years and I can't tell you how many bedroom fires or kitchen fires I have knocked down or held in check until the Engine crew has come with an 1 3/4" line.I'm not saying to take a beating and risk you life for a house, but a lot of small fires could have been knocked down quickly with a good extinguisher.
And still call the F.D. anyway that's what we get paid for
And one more thing about the website in regards to mattress fires .Once a mattress is lit it is almost impossible to put it out! Unless you totally rip it apart and hose it down.And for God's sake don't try to drag the damn thing outside.Once some fresh air hits it,it going to flair up BIG TIME,And then you have BIG BIG TROUBLES. Stay Safe Greg
The only comment that I will make that is different to yours is that the first rule you should alwayse follow is to get out and stay out. I agree that a kitchen grease fire can be contained by a homeowner but only if they know or better yet been shown how to use an extiinguisher. But once you have spent your extinguisher call from a neighbors house or portable phone for help outside the house with the fire. Be it pro or volunteer most response times will be quite quick. I've found people only steps from a door when entering a burning building. This job would be so much easier if I didn't have to deal with that.
Scott T.
Get some training too!
Fires can be put out safely if you know what you are doing.. I was a firefighting instructor trained by the Navy and we used to take our trainees into raging burning buildings and show them how to fight a fire safely. Actually what we did is pour hundreds of gallons of JP5 into steel buildings and light them on fire and wait untill they were good and roaring before we charged the hose.
Keep your head close to the ground where the fresh air is coming from and aim the nozzle at the base of the flame. if it get's too hot for you spray yourself down with water.. Throw a wet blanket/towel or something over your hair since that's the first thing that will ignite.
>>Hurray! for smoke detectors..
And lets not forget CO detectors - they can spot a fire before a smoke detector, in some cases!
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Edited 11/18/2003 11:35:10 PM ET by Bob Walker
Sprinklers in the home? I hate the idea. Sprinklers help to knock down a fire , yes. They do not put it out. You must be on public water to have them. They look like hell. Too many chances for them to go off when not needed. Too much money for the little bit of possible protection. I have advised a few clients now to fight the municipalities they live in over these. I can not see an old house or a new stick framed for that matter, with sprinklers.
Just my two cents,
Curly
Restoring the past for the future.
The insurance company actuarys would tend to differ with you on the cost benefit analysis on home sprinklers. I tend to differ with you on the esthetics - not all look bad, to me anyway. And they can and do put out a lot of fires. I plan on having sprinklers in the house I am now planning to build and they will not be the recessed type, but will be sticking out in all their glory (although I am thinking about using copper piping rather than black).
The U.K. Fire Sprinkler Assn claims residential sprinklers will virtually eliminate fire deaths and reduce property damage by 80% in the U.K. But maybe fire acts differently over there - you think???
http://www.firesprinklers.org.uk/
The Home Fire Sprinkler coalition says home sprinklers save lives, reduce property damage, and can save on home owner's insurance.
http://www.homefiresprinkler.org/hfsc.html
I am sure that the Fire Sprinkler Network says much the same (I didn't dig it out)
http://www.sprinklernet.org/
As well as the NFPA:
http://www.nfpa.org/catalog/home/index.asp
Hey, but what do all these organizations know, right.
Having worked to design and inspect sprinkler systems )for what was the largest industrial insurance company in the 1960s) in large factories and warehouses I know that sprinklers will put out a wide variety of fires (the problem is not that they don't put them out, but they keep dumping water on them even when they are out). However, from what you say, I guess that experience is irrelvant and fires and fire sprinklers just act differently in warehouses than they do in homes.
Hey Casey: have you gotten any prices on installing sprinklers for your home? There were a couple of threads here and guys were saying about a $1.00 a square foot.My house is 3100 sq ft and I'm getting $$ around $9,000-$10,000
As far as water damage I have seen some but it was only after a fire,freezing pipes,or some one whacking the head off the sprinkler.
I also talked to my insurance agent and asked her about claims from water damage from an accidental head tripping, she say's the claims are minimal if any at all.
I am planning on doing my own. I have all my old pipe dies and wrenches, although if I do it in copper, I won't need them. I would really like to do it in Pex if I can figure out a way to make it look right, so I wouldn't have to worry so much about them freezing if I decide to head to warmer climes some January. (Of course, just because it is freezing doesn't mean that fires won't occur. As I mentioned in a thread a couple of years ago, when I was in Barrow, AK, Eskimo Joe's Cafe went up in flames one afternoon when the temps were well below zero and all of the fire department's hoses froze solid, so they just watched it burn to the ground.)
The guys that gave me the estimate were going to do it in cpvc?? not hard pipe
Couldn't agree with you more.
Some, but not all, insurance companies give discounts on HO insurance for residential sprinkler system. Some, but agian not all states, insurance regulatory agencies require that insurance companies give discounts. The require systems to qualify for a discount are pretty simple from what I have seen. Only the high risk areas need the protection, not every room and space in the house. My guess is that the cost of a home system could be recovered in insurance saving alone in less than 10 years.
Dave