Flexible or portable closure – partition – or panel – Plural and/or with rigid closure – Roll type
Patent
1997-10-22
2000-06-06
Purol, David M.
Flexible or portable closure, partition, or panel
Plural and/or with rigid closure
Roll type
160 25, 1603491, E06B 908
Patent
active
060706406
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a fire-limiting and smoke limiting construction for preventing fire from propagating and smoke from diffusing within a building. More specifically, the invention relates to a fire limiting screen arrangement employing a non-combustible or fire-resistive screen formed of a glass fiber fabric or silica cloth or the like, with a walk-through feature permitting people to easily pass therethrough.
2. Description of the Related Art
It has been required to provide fire limit zones and smoke limit zones within a relatively large buildings and to further provide refugee paths so as to prevent fire from propagating and smoke from diffusing, and to facilitate evacuation. Thus, fire-proof bulkheads, smoke screens, fire shutters, fire retarding doors and the like have been provided.
As is well known, a fire shutter is a steel shutter having a fire resistant property. Typically, the fire shutter has a construction in which a plurality of slats are connected via flexible linkages to be rolled up by means of an electric motor or the like. The fire shutter is operative between a normal state where it is rolled up and stored in an upper portion of the boundary of the fire limit and a state where it is pulled down or developed to close an opening of the building upon the occurrence of fire. In view of its nature, the fire shutter may not be built-in a fire retarding door. Once the fire shutter is pulled down or developed, people cannot pass through the shutter. In order to certainly provide a refugee path for people, it becomes necessary to provide the fire retarding door in the vicinity of the fire shutter. Typically, the fire retarding door is designed to be automatically closed upon the occurrence of fire and can be opened at any time in an evacuating direction.
If a large number of fire-proof bulkheads are provided in various places in a building, fire proofing and smoke-proofing performance can be enhanced. However, it is not practical to provide a large number of such fire-proof bulkheads disregarding the original and desired functionality or convenience of use. Furthermore, various factors, such as matching wall surfaces, storage space in the normal state, easiness of evacuation in an emergency, and installation cost, have to be considered by a designer.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The inventors have made extensive research and development for a fire limiting screen arrangement which can be easy to implement while employing a flexible heat resistive and fire-proofing cloth screen at low cost, requires smaller space for storage, demonstrates relatively high fire-proofing and smoke-retarding performance, and can permit people to pass through when in the closed condition to facilitate evacuation in an emergency.
The basic idea of the invention is a walk through type fire limiting screen arrangement to separate an interior space of the building by means of a fire-proofing screen extending from the ceiling to the floor, and to form one or more slits extending from an intermediate height position between the ceiling surface and the floor surface at appropriate locations for providing refugee paths. By employing flexible silica cloth as the screen, the slit easily can be widened by hand to permit people to pass through.
It has been found that it is not easy to achieve both enhancement of fire-proofing and smoke-proofing performance (enhancing heat isolation and smoke blocking performance) for a fire screen formed with a slit and ease of passage through the slit. Namely, when a person passes through the slit refugee path, the person widens the slit by hand and body. If the widened gap remains after the person has passed through the slit, the relatively wide gap would degrade fire-proofing and smoke-proofing performance significantly. On the other hand, when a measure is taken to quickly restore the original screen state after the person passes through the slit, such measure can serve to interfere with passing through by people.
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Honma Masahiko
Miyagawa Yasuyuki
Miyake Akira
Muraoka Kou
Obayashi Corporation
Purol David M.
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