In this study, the fire growth and suppression models in FireFOAM were validated for rack-storage commodities consisting of two solid fuels, namely corrugated cardboard boxes and hardwood pallets, which are referred to as Class 2 commodity. Validation experiments included two fire-growth and two fire-suppression configurations with different rack-storage array heights (3 and 5 tiers). In the suppression study, standard-response upright ceiling sprinklers (K-factor of 160lpm/bar^1/2) were used. The time-resolved chemical heat release rates obtained from the experiments were used to validate the fire growth model. The observed sprinkler activations and fire-spread patterns were used to validate the suppression model. This study identified that lateral flame spread is primarily enabled by flames impinging on the commodity's bottom surfaces. This study also showed that obstructions, such as wood pallets, can significantly impede convective and radiative heat transfer to the underside of the commodity, reducing the lateral flame spread rate. Fire-suppression modeling revealed that both surface water transport and lateral flame spread rates are important when predicting fire-suppression behavior. Therefore, as the rack-storage array height increases, so does the water transport time, which results in the fire becoming more difficult to control. Likewise, as the lateral spread rate increases, e.g., as occurs in the absence of wood pallets, fire-suppression also becomes more difficult.

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underside of wood rackstorage array heights convective and radiative heat transfer obstructions sprinkler activations and firespread patterns configurations surface water transport lateral flame spread rates predicting firesuppression behavior therefore timeresolved chemical heat release rates commodity ceiling sprinklers fire growth and suppression models flames impinging commoditys bottom

Ning Ren, Xiangyang Zhou, Jaap de Vries, Marcos Chaos, Yi Wang, Karl V. Meredith,.Large-scale fire suppression modeling of corrugated cardboard boxes on wood pallets in rack-storage configurations. (),.

Ning Ren, et al."Large-scale fire suppression modeling of corrugated cardboard boxes on wood pallets in rack-storage configurations"

Ning Ren, Xiangyang Zhou, Jaap de Vries, Marcos Chaos, Yi Wang, Karl V. Meredith,"Large-scale fire suppression modeling of corrugated cardboard boxes on wood pallets in rack-storage configurations"