Postgraduate Course: Fire Resistance of Structures (PGEE11048)

Course Outline
School	School of Engineering	College	College of Science and Engineering
Credit level (Normal year taken)	SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate)	Availability	Not available to visiting students
SCQF Credits	10	ECTS Credits	5
Summary	The course will provide a brief overview of the fundamentals of fire behaviour in buildings and introduce simple methods of quantifying the the threat it poses to structures. This will involve estimating the temperatures in building compartments and the temperatures that individual structural members get exposed to as a function of time. Fundamentals of the behaviour of common construction materials and estimation of the variation of mechanical properties of construction materials affected by fire (i.e. temperature rise). Structural analysis principles are then applied to the fire problem. Simple methods to carry out calculations to determine structural behaviour in the event of a fire will be presented followed by an introduction to advanced analytical and computational tools for analysing structural behaviour in fire. Finally an introduction to current (code based) design procedures and performance based design will be provided and a design project will be assigned.
Course description	Not entered

Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites		Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations		Other requirements	None

Course Delivery Information
Not being delivered

Learning Outcomes
Understand the use, advantages and limitations of analytical and empirical models of structural behaviour in fire - Brief survey of the different analytical and empirical tools for fire calculations Understanding of the effect of temperature on material properties of - Steel, concrete, wood, composites Understand heat transfer calculations based on standard fires - ISO 834 - Parametric Temperature vs. Time Curves - Fire Proofing and Thermal Insulation - Real Fires (Temperature vs. Heat Flux) Be able to apply heat transfer calculations to structural elements - Steel - high thermal conductivity - Concrete - low thermal conductivity - Composite elements Understand the role of loss of strength, deformation and thermal expansion and application to design of structures for fire resistance - Analytical principles and calculations - Computational Models - Design