Fire ratings of contents without collapse.

How ratings are determined

masonry walls provide 1-, 2-, 3-, and 4-hour fire rat-
ings are shown. These ratings are from
the National Institute of Standards and
Technology, the American Insurance
What they don’t say about masonry—but should Association, and the Uniform Building
Code (UBC). Fire ratings of masonry
By Christine Beall wall assemblies also are published by
the National Fire Protection Associa-
tion (NFPA) in its Fire Protection
Handbook, by the Underwriters’ Lab-

A
fter four-fifths of London was Masonry structures are classed as oratories in its Fire Resistance Index,
destroyed by a great fire in “Fire-resistant” or “Type I” construc- and by other building codes.
1666, King Charles II decreed tion, the highest rating possible. Ac- Fire resistance ratings are based on
that the walls of all new buildings cording to the National Institute of standard ASTM or NFPA fire en-
must be masonry. Today’s building Standards and Technology (NIST), durance tests. One side of a specimen
codes aren’t that restrictive, but they construction is considered to be fire- is subjected to controlled heat for a
do recognize the fire resistance of ma- resistant if it has a 4-hour fire rating or maximum of 8 hours and 2,300_ F.
sonry. can withstand complete combustion of Wall assemblies also must undergo a
hose stream test to evaluate their re-
sistance to impact, erosion, and ther-
EQUIVALENT THICKNESS REQUIRED FOR CMUs mal shock. Bearing walls and columns
(inches) are loaded during the test to full design
Aggregate Used to Make the Fire Ratings (hour) stresses. Fire ratings, generally in 1- or
Concrete Masonry Units 1/2-hour increments, are assigned ac-
4 3 2 1 cording to the elapsed time at which
Expanded slag or pumice 4.7 4.0 3.2 2.1 the test is stopped. The test is stopped
Expanded clay or shale 5.7 4.8 3.8 2.6 when any one of three conditions is
Expanded shale, clay, or 5.4 4.5 4.0 2.6 met:
slate (rotary kiln process) 1. A maximum rise of 250_ F is
measured on the unexposed side of the
Limestone, cinders, or 5.9 5.0 4.0 2.7 wall.
unexpanded slag 2. Heat, flame, or gases escape to
Calcareous gravel 6.2 5.3 4.2 2.8 the unexposed side igniting cotton
waste samples.
Siliceous gravel 6.7 6.7 4.5 3.0
3. The wall collapses under the de-
sign load (load-bearing construction
If members are framed into wall, they are noncombustible. only).
Source: Uniform Building Code
Rating influences
Fire ratings for brick or clay tile
walls depend to some extent on the
percent of cored area in the individual
units. An 8-inch hollow tile contains
less mass than an 8-inch solid brick.
Thus it’s less resistant to fire and heat.
The percent of core area affects the
fire resistance of concrete masonry
too. So does the unit thickness and the
type of aggregate in the concrete.
Increasing the wall thickness or fill-
ing the cores with grout increases the
rating. Units with less than 25% cored
area are considered solid, and the actu-
al thickness of the brick or block is
used for calculations. Units with more
than 25% coring are considered hol-
low, and the equivalent thickness of
solid material must be computed to de-
termine the fire rating. The unit’s actu- Lightweight aggregates, such as Ratings don’t tell all
al thickness is multiplied by its percent pumice, expanded slag, clay, and Walls that have the same fire ratings
solids, which is provided by the block shale, transfer less heat in a fire be- don’t necessarily provide the same
manufacturer. For example, a nominal cause of the small air voids they con- amount of safety in a fire—to people
8-inch hollow unit said to be 55% sol- tain. Masonry units made with these or property. That is because fire ratings
id has an equivalent solid thickness of aggregates can be thinner and achieve can be misleading. In the fire resis-
4.19 inches (7.625 x 0.55). the same fire rating as heavyweight tance tests that we described earlier,
As shown in the table, if this 8-inch units. the first two end-points relate to fire
block is made with siliceous aggregate Applying plaster to one or both spread through the wall—either an ex-
it has a 1-hour fire rating. If it’s made sides of a clay or concrete masonry cessive increase in heat or actual igni-
with any other aggregate listed in the wall also increases its fire rating. For tion on the unexposed side of the wall.
table, it has a 2-hour fire rating. The hollow units, add the plaster thickness The third end-point is a structural fail-
type of aggregate used to make the to the equivalent solid thickness when ure of the wall. Yet each criterion car-
block affects its fire resistance a lot. calculating the fire rating.
ries the same weight in determining
the fire rating. A wall that collapses in
1 hour has the same 1-hour fire rating
as a wall that conducts too much heat
in that time.
Fire ratings of masonry walls almost
always are based on heat transmission,
not on structural collapse. This is an
important difference. Unlike many
wall constructions, a masonry wall
maintains its structural integrity far
beyond the time indicated by the fire
rating. In a real fire, a masonry wall
with a l-hour fire rating won’t collapse
on occupants and fire fighters in 1
hour. A wood-frame wall with a 1-
hour fire rating probably will. This
means the masonry building is safer
and suffers less property damage. Af-
ter a fire, a masonry building can be
repaired easily and at far less expense
than complete rebuilding.

Christine Beall is an architect and

PUBLICATION #M890486
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