US3832812A

US3832812A - Fire retardant insulated modular building panels

Info

Publication number: US3832812A
Application number: US00260195A
Authority: US
Inventors: H Hiatt
Original assignee: ANNAPOLIS YACHT YARD Inc
Current assignee: ANNAPOLIS YACHT YARD Inc
Priority date: 1972-06-06
Filing date: 1972-06-06
Publication date: 1974-09-03
Anticipated expiration: 1991-09-03

Abstract

A fire retardant, weight-bearing building panel having a frame enclosing fiberglass insulating material which is press-fitted between a pair of aluminum-plywood bonded sheet faces. The plywood is treated with a solution to render it substantially non-combustible. Added fire resistance is obtained by including one or two sheets of gypsum board between the outer wood sheets.

Description

[ Sept. 3, 1974 1 1 FIRE RETARDANT INSULATED MODULAR BUILDING PANELS [75] Inventor: Henry G. Hiatt, Edgewater, Md.

1731 Assignee: Annapolis Yacht Yard, Inca,

Annapolis, Md.

1221 Filed: June 6, 1972 1211 Appl. No.: 260,195

. 152] US. Cl 52/127, 52/469, 52/580, 52/573 [51] Int. Cl E04b 1/343, E04b 1/41 {58] Field of Search 52/404413, 52/456-458, 612629, 580, 586, 582, 755, 766, 127, 469, 232, 756, 573; 117/132 BC [56] References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 948,450 2/1910 Hussey 52/404 1,187,545 6/1916 Olberg 52/405 2,054,694 9/1936 Eldredge... 52/615 2,233,711 3/1941 Pasquier 52/615 2,582,467 1/1952 Sylvan 52/623 2,593,050 4/1952 Paul et a1 1, 52/615 3,160.515 12/1964 Goldstein et 117/136 3,194,777 7/1965 Christenson et a1, 117/132 3,217,455 11/1965 Burges 1 52/404 3,235,040 2/1966 Ellis 52/623v 3,273,297 9/1966 Wehe 1 1 52/404 3,285,774 11/1966 (ioldstcin et all, 117/136 3,364,645 1/1968 wenzelbergcrn. 52/615 3,711,313 1/1973 Nagano et ul. 117/1321! Primary lixaminer]ohn E. Murtagh Assistant Examiner-.1ames L. Ridgill, Jr. Attorney, Agent, or Firm-Arthur Schwartz 5 7 ABSTRACT A fire retardant, weight-bearing building panel having a frame enclosing fiberglass insulating material which is press-fitted between a pair of aluminum-plywood bonded sheet faces. The plywood is treated with a solution to render it substantially non-combustible. Added fire resistance is obtained by including one or two sheets of gypsum board between the outer wood sheets.

9 Claims, 7 Drawing Figures FIRE RETARDANT INSULATED MODULAR BUILDING PANELS BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The invention relates to fire resistant, weight-bearing panels which are designed for use in cold storage structures. More specifically, the panels are built in modular form to be incorporated in cold storage buildings adapted to house refrigerated foods.

Cold storage rooms and buildings must be able to not only provide the necessary insulation to keep the food cold, but must also be able to meet certain fire hazard classifications. For example, a recognized authority in material and product testing for public safety is the Underwriters Laboratory, Inc. Within their fire hazard classification they have established minimum standards in three categories for testing building materials. The classification includes the following areas:

Flame Spread how fast the flame will spread over the length of the material which is placed in a furnace specifically designed for such tests. An acceptable rating is 25.

Fuel Contribution an indication of how much the material in the furnace contributes to the fuel; Having a known Btu input, the output is measured, and the difference is the fuel contribution. An acceptable rating in this area is also 25.

Smoke Developed a measure of the smoke coming out of the chimney as a result of the test material being burnt. Again, 25 is an acceptable rating.

Finally, there is a rating given relative to the time it takes for a wall panel to burn completely through. An acceptable classification in certain instances may be a 30-minute wall, while in others it is desirable to have a 1-hour or a 2-hour wall. While the wall panel is being exposed to the fire, it will be required to support the equivalent to a 60 pounds per square foot roof loading.

Therefore, in designing a weight-bearing wall panel it is necessary to take into consideration the length of time it takes the panel to burn completely through while supporting an equivalent roof load of 60 pounds per square foot, the flame spread, fuel contributed and smoke developed.

2. Description of Prior Art On a commercial scale the most widely used modular panels include foamed plastic material as the primary source of insulation. While such panels may have an acceptable Flame Spread rating of, for example 25, they have a distinct disadvantage in that the melting point of foam is about 150 to 250 F. This has provided in some tests a Smoke Developed rating of over 500. The smoke is black and toxic so fire-fighters are often unable to find the exact location of the fire. Also, whereas there may be only superficial damage to the exterior of the building structure, the actual damage may be in the order of hundreds or thousands of times worse because the entire foam interior of the building may have melted.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In accordance with the instant invention, the shortcomings and disadvantages of the prior art have been alleviated by the unique combination of materials to provide a fire retardant panel having the desired fire resistance test capability, as well as appropriate fire hazard classifications. Set out below will be three types of panels which have nominal ratings of 30 minutes, 1 hour and 2 hours, respectively. The panels designed by Applicant have a fire hazard classification as follows:

Flame Spread 25 Fuel Contributed 10 Smoke Developed 0 As will be seen from the discussion below and when compared to the prior art, Applicants panel has the same fire resistance time test, comparable Flame Spread and Fuel Contribution, but developed no smoke when exposed to heat and fire.

The first embodiment of the invention may be considered as nominally a ,30-minute wall having an interior face of plywood with an aluminum or baked reflective acrylic metal surface bonded thereto. The aluminum-plywood face is attached to a wood frame having fiberglass insulation press-fitted therein. To the other side of the frame is attached a second aluminumplywood bonded face.

A SO-minute roofing panel is constructed in a similar manner.

A second embodiment of the 30-rninute wall is in the form of at least a one-hour wall which has one sheet of gypsum board running through the center of the fiberglass.

A third embodiment designed to be rated as at least a 2-hour wall includes gypsum board positioned between each plywood face and the inner section of fiberglass.

As will be seen in the detailed discussion of the various embodiments below, the instant invention combines the properties of each of the components to provide a compact panel member which is not only effective as a thermal insulating panel, but also provides the necessary fire resistance and weight-bearing capability to make it superior to the known prior art.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS Further advantages of the invention will become apparent from the detailed description below when taken with the accompanying drawings which illustrate, by way of examples, several embodiments of the invention wherein:

FIG. 1 is a plan view of a wall panel of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is an enlarged fragmentary transverse sectional view, taken along line 2-2 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is an enlarged vertical sectional view, taken along line 33 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 4 is a vertical section view similar to FIG. 3 of a modified form of the wall panel;

FIG. 5 is an enlarged fragmentary vertical sectional view, taken along line 5-5 of FIG. 4;

FIG. 6 is a vertical sectional view of still another modification of the wall panel; and

FIG. 7 is an enlarged fragmentary vertical sectional view taken along line 7-7 of FIG. 6.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION FIG. 1 illustrates three modular panels ll, 3 and 5 connected together by a plurality of lag and pod arrangements 7. As seen in FIGS. 2 and 3 the sections have an exterior face 9 and an interior face 11. The exterior face 9 is composed of a plywood layer 13 having a natural aluminum or a baked reflective acrylic metal surface 15 bonded thereto. The aluminum bonded metal surface is easily cleaned, always stays sanitary (U.S.D.A. approved) and positively reflects sun rays.

The plywood face which is about one-quarter inch thick is treated with a fire-retardant chemical such described as in US. Pat. Nos. 3,160,515 or 3,285,774 or that sold under the trademark name of Non-Com Exterior by Koppers Company, Inc. The salt solution used for treating the plywood is pressure impregnated into the wood in autoclaves capable of withstanding pressure of up to 200 pounds per square inch. After impregnation, the plywood is processed in a kiln where the chemicals of impregnation are cured. The curing sets the chemicals in the wood cells and imparts durable weather-resisting fire retardance. The plywood so treated itself has an Underwriters Laboratory fire hazard classification of 25 or less for Flame Spread, Fuel Contributed and Smoke Developed, and shows no sign of progressive combustion when the fire hazard classification test is continued for minutes. This rating applies regardless of the exposure. This particular treatment will not leech out and has no significant change in performance after exposure to weather and moisture.

A plurality of plastic access hole covers 17 may be placed at appropriate intervals along the interior face for the purpose of covering holes cut in the face 11 for providing access to lag and pod connectors 7.

Framing means have a pair of end rails 19 and a pair of side rails 21 positioned between the interior and exterior faces 9 and 11. The framing members also include a plurality of interior bracing sections 23. The interior bracing sections are separated from one another by a space 25 to prevent heat conduction through modular panel. An oversized batt form of fiberglass insulation 27 (for example, RA-25, Owens-Corning) is pressfitted in each of the sections between the interior and exterior faces. The plywood faces are secured to the framing members by means of a plastic resin glue 28 around the perimeter of the framing. Staples 29 are used along the perimeter to further secure the faces to the framing members. The fiberglass insulating material 27 is pressed into spaces 25.

A mastic sealing caulking tape with aluminum trim 31 is seen in FIGS. 1, 2, 5 and 7 covering the area adjoining the panels.

A quarter-inch felt joint 33 to serve as an expansion joint is positioned between the joined side panels 21. The joint is composed of two one-eighth inch wool felt gaskets treated against fungus and water on each side panel and permits expansion and contraction counteracting effects of rapid temperature change. This is seen in greater detail in FIGS. 5 and 7 which will be discussed in greater detail below with the respective modifications.

The embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 4 and 5 is identical with that shown in FIGS. 1-3 except that a fiveeighth inch fire rated gypsum wall board 35 is positioned between the joint members 23 in space 25. This single gypsum board will add at least an extra half-hour to the wall rating, thus providing at least a 1-hour rated wall, i.e., it will take an hour to burn through the entire wall panel under certain specified test conditions. The fiberglass is positioned in two sections 27 on each side of the gypsum board 35.

The embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 6 and 7 illustrates a 2-hour rated fire wall and is the same as the embodiments of FIGS. 1-3 except that it includes a pair of five-eighth inch fire-rated gypsum wallboards 37 nailed to the spreaders before securing the interior and exterior aluminum bonded plywood faces. This particular structure will give at least a 2-hour rated wall.

A roofing panel has been designed in substantially the same manner as the wall panel. The primary difference is that the exterior face is one-half inch plywood as opposed to one-quarter inch plywood in the wall panels.

While there has been described and illustrated specific embodiments of the invention, it will be clear that variations in the details of the embodiments specifically illustrated and described may be made without departing from the true spirit and scope of the invention as defined in the appended claims.

What is claimed is:

l. A fire retardant insulated building wall comprising:

a. a plurality of modular panels each including:

1. framing means for supporting a plurality of sheet materials; 2. fiberglass insulating material within said framing means; 3. plywood sheets positioned transversely on each side of said framing means for fully enclosing said fiberglass material adjacent the interior surfaces thereof, said plywood sheets being treated with a solution for rendering them substantially noncombustible; 4. metal bonded to the exterior surface of said plywood sheets; and 5. at least one pair of interior bracing sections separated from one another to prevent heat conduction through the modular panel; b. said plurality of panels being secured together by attaching means, and covered access openings on at least one side of the panel to provide access to the attaching means joining said panels together; and c. expansion materials between adjacent panels and a sealing trim material over the line of juncture. 2. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 1 wherein a building panel is provided having an Underwriters Laboratory classification of about 25 or less for Flame Spread, Fuel Contribution, and Smoke Developed.

3. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 2 wherein said classification is about as follows:

Flame Spread 25 Fuel Contributed 10 Smoke Developed 0.

4. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 1 including at least one sheet of additional fire resistant material between said wood sheets.

5. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 4 wherein said fire resistant material is gypsum board.

6. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 4 wherein a sheet of said fire resistant material is positioned approximately midway between said wood sheets.

6 7. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined aluminum therein. in claim 4 wherein a sheet of said fire resistant material 9. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined is positioned adjacent each of said wood sheets. in claim 1 wherein said metal sheets have a baked re- 8. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined flective acrylic metal surface. in claim 1 wherein said metal sheets at least include 5

Claims

1. A fire retardant insulated building wall comprising: a. a plurality of modular panels each including: 1. framing means for supporting a plurality of sheet materials; 2. fiberglass insulating material within said framing means; 3. plywood sheets positioned transversely on each side of said framing means for fully enclosing said fiberglass material adjacent the interior surfaces thereof, said plywood sheets being treated with a solution for rendering them substantially non-combustible; 4. metal bonded to the exterior surface of said plywood sheets; and 5. at least one pair of interior bracing sections separated from one another to prevent heat conduction through the modular panel; b. said plurality of panels being secured together by attaching means, and covered access openings on at least one side of the panel to provide access to the attaching means joining said panels together; and c. expansion materials between adjacent panels and a sealing trim material over the line of juncture.

2. fiberglass insulating material within said framing means;

2. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 1 wherein a building panel is provided having an Underwriter''s Laboratory classification of about 25 or less for Flame Spread, Fuel Contribution, and Smoke Developed.

3. plywood sheets positioned transversely on each side of said framing means for fully enclosing said fiberglass material adjacent the interior surfaces thereof, said plywood sheets being treated with a solution for rendering them substantially non-combustible;

4. metal bonded to the exterior surface of said plywood sheets; and

5. at least one pair of interior bracing sections separated from one another to prevent heat conduction through the modular panel; b. said plurality of panels being secured together by attaching means, and covered access openings on at least one side of the panel to provide access to the attaching means joining said panels together; and c. expansion materials between adjacent panels and a sealing trim material over the line of juncture.

7. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 4 wherein a sheet of said fire resistant material is positioned adjacent each of said wood sheets.

8. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 1 wherein said metal sheets at least include aluminum therein.

9. A fire retardant insulated building panel as defined in claim 1 wherein said metal sheets have a baked reflective acrylic metal surface.