ESTIMATE OF FLAME RADIANCE VIA A SINGLE LOCATION MEASUREMENT IN LIQUID POOL FIRES

A method for estimating the radiative heat loss fraction (chi-R), the ratio of the flame energy radiated to the surroundings to the idealized combustion heat release, is developed for pool fires. Experimental investigation of small to medium sized pool fires (4.6-30 cm) shows that a radiance measurement made at a single location and corrected for anisotropic effects yields an estimate of chi-R that is within 13% of the multilocation measurement of chi-R. Eight fuels were tested, with heat release rates of 0.6-120 kW and values of chi-R from 0.16 to 0.35. A previously proposed rule for finding chi-R from one-location radiance measurements was also tested and works reasonably well for nonluminous alchol flames.