Effect of Smoke Source and Horn Configuration on Enhanced Deposition, Acoustic Agglomeration, and Chladni Figures in Smoke Detectors

A series of UL/EN based test fires was conducted in a two room/corridor enclosure to investigate the viability of methods for determining whether a smoke detector sounded under a variety of smoke conditions and to see if this methodology could be applied to a detector with a different horn configuration.

The presence of enhanced deposition in the form of a black or orange-brown ring and agglomerates around the central opening of a smoke detector horn was found to be a reliable indicator that the horn sounded when it was exposed to smoke from eight standardized, single-substrate fuel sources including hydrocarbon pool, flaming polyurethane foam, and smoldering polyurethane foam fires.

Determinations could generally not be made for detectors exposed to white or gray smoke generated by flaming paper, smoldering paper, flaming wood, smoldering wood, and smoldering cotton wick due to a general lack of visible soot deposition within the detector. Therefore, it is not recommended to use the absence of a black or orange-brown ring of enhanced deposition, in and of itself, as an indicator that the horn did not sound.

Nevertheless, this conclusion can be reached when the absence of enhanced deposition is combined with evidence supporting the presence of flaming fuels that produce black, sooty smoke. Test series were conducted using two different smoke detector brands, each having a different horn configuration. Findings suggest that the same type of methodology for determining whether the detector sounded is applicable to both models.

Chladni figures were not found on any of the smoke detectors, whether they sounded or not; hence, the absence of a Chladni figure was not an indicator that the detector did not sound. A smoke flow visualization technique was used to determine the mechanism that caused the observed enhanced deposition and agglomerates on horns that sounded during a smoke exposure.

Additionally, a smoke box test series showed that the extent of observed soot deposition increased with increasing smoke exposure.