Tenmat cavity fire barriers – age testing confirms working life of 60 years
At Tenmat we are committed to continuously improving the effectiveness of our solutions. Utilising our onsite laboratory, manufacturing and testing facilities alongside independent third party testing and certification bodies, we invest extensively in research and development to ensure our products deliver the best possible performance.
Equally, we believe that our product information needs to be as clear, accurate, and unambiguous as possible. Indeed, we achieved CCPI verification for our cavity barriers (the first products of their kind to do so) earlier this year.
For these reasons, our cavity fire barriers have undergone additional rigorous testing to enable us to accurately define their working life.
60 years of fire protection
Tenmat cavity fire barriers far outlast other products on the market
Product service life is one area in which many cavity barriers underperform – usually providing the necessary levels of protection for just 10 – 25 years. As a result, site inspections and refurbishments must take place regularly, compounding costs well into the future and inconveniencing building occupants whenever they take place.
Conversely, the results of independent, accredited third-party testing show that all grades of active intumescent components used in Tenmat cavity fire barriers have a working life of 60 years. This not only results in exceptional value across the full design life of the project compared with other products on the market, but further evidences the excellent lifetime performance of Tenmat cavity barriers – which also hold third party IFC certification for fire resistance performance.
Chris Thompson
Tenmat Global Product Manager Chris Thompson elaborates:
“The intumescent we manufacture at Tenmat consists of a unique formula that sets it apart from other intumescents on the market. And, having been manufactured for many decades, the intumescent has a long standing history of use. This means there are multiple instances in which the intumescent has been naturally age tested – enabling us to assess its performance over extended time periods.
“We have also engaged in third party testing and assessment to more rigorously evaluate the intumescent’s ability to withstand ageing. This includes accelerated age testing and durability testing, in which the product undergoes a combination of lab based age testing and prolonged environmental exposure. In each range of tests, the fire performance of the intumescent remained unaffected – allowing a working life of 60 years to be confirmed.”
Our intumescent up-close
The active ingredient used in our intumescent materials is expandable graphite. The heat from a fire causes the graphite flakes to rapidly expand. Tenmat intumescents differ from the majority of others on the market as we combine the expandable graphite with a high level of inorganic content such as rock mineral fibres and only a small proportion of organic binder.
In normal conditions, this high proportion of inorganic materials results in intumescents resistant to environmental exposure and ageing. In a fire situation the graphite forces the fibres apart which then form a matrix structure to create a stable and insulative char that limits fire spread.
For more information about our cavity fire barriers, or to place an order, contact us.
