A Web-based Introduction to Fire Modeling
This introduction was written and web-formatted by Mike Gencarelli, B.S. 2003
Questions or comments can be directed to Dr. A. Trouve at atrouve@umd.edu.
Fire Modeling Introduction
Models are helpful tools to scientists and engineers. Engineers use models to reconstruct specific fire scenarios or to design fire protection systems. Scientists use models to observe specific fire phenomena without the expense of full scale testing. It is not hard to imagine that fire protection engineers use models on a daily basis.
The purpose of this introduction is to propose an easy-to-read overview of fire modeling. Two specific types of widely used models will be compared at the end of this introduction. These models are zone and Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) models, which both belong to the category of deterministic computational fire models.
Deterministic computational fire models are certainly a mouth-full, but not difficult to understand. So before delving into zone and CFD modeling, we will learn about the different types of fire models.
The structure of this introduction is broken down as follows:
- Fire Models (you are here)
- Experimental Models
- Mathematical Models
- Probabilistic Models
- Deterministic Models
- Zone Models
- CFD Models
- Compare Zone and CFD Models
- Definitions
For the remainder of this document you can follow the links to a definition of the highlighted word or further explanation of the corresponding subject.
***If you would like a explanation on what fire is and how it works click here to go to the howstuffworks.com site***
