Substrate Construction
Substrate construction is a reference to the wall or floor system that forms the fire compartmentation. Different products and systems will provide different levels of fire resistance.
Whilst certain test evidence can be interchangeable for some other substrates (e.g. flexible wall data covers certain rigid wall scenarios) it is critical that the passive fire protection system tested scope of application covers the specific wall or floor type.
Floor constructions may consist of:
- Reinforced (in situ poured) concrete
- Precast hollow core concrete planks
- Steel profile and concrete
- Timber joist and plasterboard
Wall constructions may consist of:
- Single skin plasterboard to each side of a stud
- Double skin plasterboard to each side of a stud
- Solid concrete
- Concrete blockwork
- Shaftwall
- Specific wall systems such as Porotherm/Specwall
The purpose of a fire stop seal is to repair or maintain the fire resistance of a fire compartment and is, therefore, reliant on the performance of the substrate.
In effect, the fire stop seal can only ever be as good as the supporting construction so the starting point when identifying tested solutions is to identify what is being penetrated.