ARTICLE IN PRESS
doi:10.1016/j.fir
Fire Safety Journal 41 (2006) 628–629
www.elsevier.com/locate/firesaf
Book review
Design of Steel Structures Subjected to Fire: Background
and Design Guide to Eurocode 3. Jean-Marc Franssen, Raul
Zaharia. Editions de l’universite de Liege (2005) (h37,
Hardbound, ISBN: 2-930322-99-3).
The discipline of structural fire engineering is becomingmore popular as clients and engineers realise the economic-al savings, and increased robustness, which can be gainedfrom carrying out structural fire calculations, compared tofollowing the traditional simple ‘deemed-to-satisfy’ pre-scriptive rules. The development of the Eurocodes, first intheir ENV status and now in their recently published ENstatus, has encouraged the growth of structural fireengineering, with the loading code and suite of materialresponse codes having dedicated fire parts (denoted as Part1.2).
As with all Eurocodes, the fire design parts provideconcise information generally giving basic principles ofdesign without any detailed guidance or explanation ofhow some rules were developed. To use the codes efficientlyand safely it is important that the designer has someknowledge of the background leading to the developmentof the codes.
This book by Franssen and Zaharia, who have anoutstanding international reputation for research instructural fire engineering, provides significant backgroundknowledge required in the general use of the fire part to thesteel response code (EN1993-1-2) and, where appropriate,the fire-loading code (EN1991-1-2).
In the first part of the book, the authors present thecodified approach dealing with the different components ofstructural fire engineering, consisting of defining the designstatic load estimated at the time of the fire, the likelyseverity of the fire, the thermal response of the structureand the structural behaviour. Throughout each of thesedesign stages, guidance of how the code can be applied isdiscussed together with relevant worked examples pre-sented to emphasise key points.
Connections (or joints) are key components in both theambient and fire design, which is highlighted by the authorswho devote a separate chapter to the design of thesecomponents. Following the general theme of the book, therules given in the code are first presented followed by adiscussion on the background philosophy leading to theserules. By presenting the background information theauthors can highlight areas where the designer needs totake particular care. In this example, the possible design
esaf.2006.06.005
error is highlighted of ‘over-sizing’ members for ambienttemperature design to achieve the required fire resistancewithout checking whether the adjacent connections alsorequire ‘over-sizing’.The codes provide a range of design methods to define
the severity of the fire, the thermal response and thestructural behaviour. In terms of the fire severity, theauthors explain the background to the standard tempera-ture–time relationships, parametric curves, one and twozone models, and localised fires. Worked examples arepresented defining the temperature–time relationship usingthe localised fire approach and the parametric curve. Forthe thermal response the authors explain the methods fordefining the temperature of unprotected steel, fire-pro-tected steel and external steel, coupled with relevant andconcise design examples. For the structural behaviour, theuse of tabulated data, simple calculation models andadvanced analysis are explained, although as correctlypointed out by the authors there is no tabulated data inEN 1993-1-2 due to the relatively ease in which thesimple calculation models can be used. The explanationof the simple structural calculation methods covers allsingle members under tension, compression, bending andshear.Advanced calculation methods are beginning to be used
by a number of well-known design organisations, with theauthors dedicating a whole chapter to this area. Thelimitations of the advanced models are carefully explainedby the authors, with illustrative figures of deformedstructures showing the capabilities of advanced analysis.A range of design examples are presented in the final
chapter of the book consisting of a continuous beam, atwo-dimensional multi-storey moment resisting frame, asingle-storey industrial building and a raking system.Although these show clearly the capabilities of theadvanced models it is a shame that a design exampleinvolving a three-dimensional multi-storey building (in-cluding the floor slab) was not included, since thisapproach seems to be growing in popularity with practi-tioners.There are a few topographical errors (mainly gramma-
tical) throughout the book, which hinders the reader insome places. However, the layout of the book does allowreaders to use it as a quick reference to address specificissues with design.In summary, I recommend reading this book since
it does provide useful information to the background
ARTICLE IN PRESSBook review / Fire Safety Journal 41 (2006) 628–629 629
to EN1993-1-2, together with the appropriate partsof EN1991-1-2, which will provide designers with con-fidence in its use. It is also appropriate for students andresearchers who need to learn the basic principles of thecode.
Colin BaileySchool of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Civil Engineering,
The University of Manchester, PO Box 88, Manchester M60
1QD, UK
E-mail address: [email protected].
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