Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Constructional Steel Research

Temperature analysis of partially heated steel members in re

M.B. Wong
Department of Civil Engineering, Monash University, Wellington Road, Melbourne, Australia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Analytical methods for the evaluation of temperature distribution of steel members in re are readily available in
Received 18 August 2015 codes of practice. These methods are usually based on uniform sections under fully engulfed re conditions. In
Accepted 10 August 2016 reality, structural members are often subject to partial heating re conditions such as members passing through
Available online xxxx
multiple re compartments or subject to localised res. At present, little guidance is given for temperature calcu-
lation of steel members subject to partial heating re conditions. Evaluating the temperature distribution of steel
Keywords:
Finite difference
members in such situations is important as the results may determine the extent of re protection required for
Fire these members. This paper describes a numerical study on the temperature distribution of a partially heated
Heat transfer steel member using a simple nite difference scheme with parametrically coded generic elements. The results
Steel are compared with the approximated method given in Eurocodes whereby the average temperature of a partially
Temperatures heated steel member can be calculated. It is shown that the proposed nite difference scheme can accurately pre-
dict the temperature distribution of steel members and provides a means for assessing their re protection
requirements.
2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
In re engineering design, mainly two stages of calculations are re-
quired to be carried out for structural member design in order to meet
the re resistance requirements. The rst stage is the evaluation of tem-
perature distribution in the member and the second stage is the assess-
ment of the stability, integrity and insulation requirements for the
structural member based on the critical temperature assessment result-
ed from the rst stage. Thus, temperature calculation is crucial to the as-
sessment of the member's re resistance and the results are directly
related to the cost of the re protection requirements for the structure.
Nowadays many design codes such as the SFPE Handbook [1] and
EC3 [2] provide guidance and evaluation methods for predicting the
critical temperatures in structural members. These methods can be clas-
sied into three categories: the tabulated or experiment-based
methods, the simple calculation models and the advanced calculation
models. While the tabulated method is simple, it is restricted to those
members tested under certain structural and re conditions such as
simply supported end restraints under standard re. The advanced cal-
culation models are based on sophisticated mathematical models usual-
ly using dedicated computer software with lengthy input procedures. As
different computer software may adopt different mathematical models
for computations, the results obtained from the software should always
be veried by relevant test results [2].
E-mail address: bill.wong@monash.edu.
EC3 provides detailed information on the use of the simple calcula-
tion models for the structural re design of normal steel structures.
The calculation procedures include formulations for the generation of
design res, temperature prediction and member capacity. For temper-
ature prediction procedure, the formulation is based on heat transfer
principles between re and steel for various bare or insulated steel sec-
tions. In performing these calculations, the steel sections are assumed to
be uniform and the length innite. This method works for most re sce-
narios where the post-ashover re condition is assumed in a normal
size re compartment. However, for some situations where these as-
sumptions cannot be met, modication of the formulation needs to be
made or, in some cases, the formulation cannot be used at all.
The current study examines the applicability of the EC3 formulation
in a situation where a steel member is subject to partial heating, such as
a member passing through multiple re compartments or subject to
localised re in a large compartment. The aim of the current study is
to evaluate the temperature distribution along the length of such steel
member, part of which is fully engulfed in re. The temperature distri-
bution in the steel member using a nite difference scheme is rst cal-
culated and then compared with the average temperature of the steel
member using the EC3 formulation. In using the nite difference meth-
od in this situation, each nodal point in the mesh represents the nite
control element consisting of a nite length of the member with con-
stant cross-section. The heat ow between the nodal points is one di-
mensional whereas the heat source from re is through the surface of
each nite control element subject to re. As each nite control element
may be subject to different boundary conditions, the explicit expression
for calculating the temperature at each node within a time step must be

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jcsr.2016.08.008
0143-974X/ 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
2 M.B. Wong / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16
specic for that particular boundary condition. Thus, identifying and
handling the large number of expressions in a nite difference scheme
for all the nodal points could be complicated. The nite different meth-
od has been successfully applied to evaluate the temperatures of the
anges and the web of a steel I-section in a composite structure [3]
where each component of the steel section is subject to different bound-
ary conditions under different re exposure areas. The formulation is
complicated even for only three nite control elements. In the current
study, a parametrically coded generic nite control element is devel-
oped to cater for all possible boundary conditions under the specic
re conditions. The resulting expression is simple to use and the compu-
tational efciency is high for examining a variety of cases with different
boundary conditions along the length of the steel member. An example
demonstrating the use of the nite difference scheme shows contrasting
results to those obtained from the Eurocode.
2. Temperature prediction for steel members
The following describes a heat transfer formulation for a body re-
ceiving heat by convection and radiation using a lumped thermal capac-
ity model. The energy conservation principle for a body receiving heat
ux h_ net;c by convection and h_ net;r by radiation giving rise to a tempera-
ture increase dT within a nite time dt results in the following equation:
dT
V V cp h_ net;c As h_ net;r As 1 hc0 Lc
dt
where
= density of the body
Vv = volume of the body
cp = specic heat
As = surface area of the body exposed to re
Rearranging and writing Eq. (1) in incremental form such that
a,t =dT and t = dt gives
As =V V
_  structural applications.
a;t hnet;c h_ net;r t 2
cp
For a steel member of length L0 with constant cross-section fully
engulfed in re, the term As/VV can be written as
As =V V Am L0 =VL0 Am =V 3 3. Finite difference method
where Am and V are the surface area and volume of the member per unit
length respectively. By substituting Eq. (3) into Eq. (2), the resulting
equation forms the basis for calculating the incremental temperature
rise of bare steel members stipulated in EC3. The ratio in Eq. (3) is
termed the section factor for which expressions of design values for
various types of cross-sections of both protected and unprotected
steel members are given in EC3. For example, for a bare steel pipe
with thickness t, the section factor is 1/t. Eq. (2) is easy to use for tem-
perature prediction of steel members, the section factors of which are
readily available for various steel sections. It should be noted that the
use of Eq. (2) is based on the assumption that the whole length of the
steel member is full engulfed in re. For cases where only a portion of
the steel member length is engulfed in re, Eq. (3) needs to be modied
in order for Eq. (2) to be applicable. Let's look at a situation where a steel
member of length L0 is partially heated by re for a length L1, as depicted
in Fig. 1. The unheated length L0 L1 is subject to the ambient environ-
ment and the heat is dissipated by convection only.
In using Eq. (2) in this situation, Eq. (3) is modied such that
As =V V Am =V L1 =L0 4 conditions in order to carry out sensitivity analysis to examine the effect
Fire
Convection to surrounding
A B
L1 L0 L1
Fig. 1. Partially heated steel member.
Use of Eq. (4) is based on the lumped thermal capacity model and
the resulting temperature represents only the average of the whole
length of the member. It is valid only if the temperature gradient be-
tween the extreme points A and B shown in Fig. 1 is not great. To exam-
ine the validity of this model, the Biot number (Bi) can be calculated as
[4]:
Bi 5
k
where hc0 is the convective coefcient, k is the thermal conductivity of
steel and Lc is the characteristic length. As an example, under normal sit-
uation for a short length of a steel member L0 = 4 m subject to a heated
length L1 = 1 m, the following values can be assumed: hc0 = 4 W/m2 K,
k = 53 W/mK and Lc = 3 m. This gives a Biot number of 0.23 which is
much N 0.1, a value usually set as a maximum for lumped thermal capac-
ity analysis. In other words, the method recommended in EC3 may not
be valid for this particular situation even for a very short steel member,
let alone members which are usually a lot longer than 4 m for most
To overcome this problem and obtain a more accurate estimation of
the temperature distribution of a partially heated steel member, nite
difference method based on the Fourier's law of heat conduction for
transient heat ow analysis is adopted in this study.
The Fourier's law of heat conduction states that the heat ux q per
unit area perpendicular to the direction of ow through a homogeneous
body is proportional to the temperature gradient across the body. Math-
ematically,
q kdT=dx 6
where k is the thermal conductivity of the body with local temperature
T along the coordinate x in the direction of heat ow. For a body with
cross-sectional area Ac in one-dimensional ow, the amount of heat en-
ergy Q, in W, owing through the body is given as
Q qAc 7
In nite difference method with a large number of nodes in the
mesh, most of the nite control element would have similar expressions
for calculating temperature rise except for those along the boundary for
heat exchange with the external or internal energy source and environ-
ment. However, in the current study for one-dimension transient heat
ow, all nite control elements may be subject to different boundary
of different re exposure conditions on the temperature distribution
 M.B. Wong / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16 3

along the length of the steel member. For a large number of nodes in a The heat ow from re to the element based on EC1 [5] is
nite difference scheme, this may present difculty in terms of compu-

tational efciency as the expression for temperature rise calculation Q_ f h_ net;c h_ net;r As 11
may be different for the same node in the mesh in different sensitivity
analysis cases. To overcome this difculty, a parametrically coded ge- where
neric control element is developed in order to enhance computational
 
efciency and reduce formulation complications. h_ net;c hc g T tx 12

3.1. Parametrically coded generic element h 4  4 i

h_ net;r res g 273 T tx 273 13

Consider a section of the length of a steel member with constant

cross-section consisting of three control elements: A at node x 1, B
at node x and C at node x + 1 as shown in Fig. 2. For a generic element hc = convective heat coefcient for re environment
B subject to Neumann boundary condition only, there are possibly four g = re temperature in C
types of heat ow across its boundary: (1) the heat ow Q_ from up- B Ttx = temperature in element x at time t
wind element, (2) the heat ow Q_ C to downwind element, (3) the res = resultant emissivity of steel
heat ow Q_ from re, (4) the heat ow Q_ to the ambient environment.
f e = 5.67 108 W/m2 K4.
The net heat ow Q_ retained in x within a time step t can be written
The heat ow from the element to the surrounding is given as
as
 

 Q_ e hc0 T tx T 0 As 14
Q_ t Q_ B Q_ C Q_ f Q_ e t 8
where
where , , and are parameters with a value of either 1 or 0 for the
hc0 = convective heat coefcient for the surrounding
control of the boundary conditions of the element.
For the current study, the following possible values of parameters T0 = surrounding temperature.
can be assigned to each element: By the principle of energy conservation,
(i) For a segment with upwind ow, = 1 otherwise = 0.

_
Qt T xt1 T tx cp Ac L 15
(ii) For a segment with downwind ow, = 1 otherwise = 0.
(iii) For a heated segment subject to re, = 1 otherwise = 0.
(iv) For an unheated segment subject to surrounding, = 1 other- By combining Eq. (8) to Eq. (15), the temperature Tt+1
x of element at
wise = 0. x at a future time step t + 1 can be written as
 t 
T xt1 M T t t
" x1 T x1# 1M Nhc0 T x
For the element at x with a segment length L, heat ow from upwind _
Q f
element at time t is, according to Eqs. (6) and (7), N 16
As hc0 T 0
 
k T tx T tx1
Q_ B Ac 9 where M kt s t
and N AAc c .
L cp L2 pL

It can be seen that Eq. (16) represents a general expression for calcu-
Similarly, heat ow to downwind element is lating the temperature of a generic nite difference element under dif-
  ferent boundary conditions. By just assigning appropriate values to the
k T tx1 T tx four parameters of , , and ,the boundary condition can be easily
Q_ C Ac 10
L changed for any element.
Numerical stability requires that
 
t k As hc0
1M Nhc0  0; or 1 17
cp L L Ac

Hence, for numerical stability, the value of the time step is restricted
to

cp L
t 18
k As hc0

L Ac

4. Temperature distribution of a steel pipe

Consider a steel pipe of 1.2 m outside diameter, 10 mm thick and 4 m

Fig. 2. Parametrically coded generic element.
long passing through a localised re in a nite space. The pipe length is
extended in opposite directions from the re. Due to symmetry, only
half (L0 = 2 m) of the pipe length, all divided into 20 equal segments
of L = 0.1 m each, is analysed using the nite difference scheme as
shown in Fig. 3. The gure depicts two heated segments as an example.
With this segment length, the Biot number is much b0.1 for hc0 = 4 W/
4 M.B. Wong / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16

Fig. 3. Steel pipe subject to partial heating.

m2 K and the method is therefore valid for the current analysis. The
value of thermal conductivity of steel k is adopted from EC3.
The values of the parameters , , and are assigned for the
following elements according to their boundary conditions:
1. For the rst segment 1 subject to re, = 0, = 1, = 1, = 0.
2. For an intermediate segment subject to re with upwind and down-
wind heat ows, = 1, = 1, = 1, = 0.
3. For an intermediate segment subject to the ambient environment
with upwind and downwind heat ows, = 1, = 1, = 0, = 1.
4. For the last segment 20 subject to re, = 1, = 0, = 1, = 0; if
subject to ambient environment, = 1, = 0, = 0, = 1. The heat
loss through the end of the pipe to the ambient environment is ig-
nored due to the small area of exposure.
For a segment with only upwind and downwind heat ows such as
an insulated segment with negligible heat loss, = 1, = 1, = 0,
= 0 although this scenario has not been explored in the current study.
4.1. Element details
To study the effect of heated segments on the temperature distribu-
tion along the length of the steel pipe, the following number of seg-
ments starting from element 1 is heated in turn: 2, 4, 6, 8, 14, 18, 20
out of 20 segments. The results are compared with the approximated so-
lution for the average temperature of the whole length of pipe using EC3
method. The present example with a pipe thickness of t = 10 mm gives
a section factor of 100 m1. A larger thickness of t = 16 mm will also be
used to examine the effect of section factor on the temperature distribu-
tion. The pipe is assumed to be subject to 60 min of standard re with a
time step of 15 s. The value of the resultant emissivity res is assumed to
be 0.7 and the convective coefcient of re hc is 25 W/m2 K.
heat dissipation is fast when the pipe is subject to unheated environment.
In most cases the temperature in the last segment always remains at am-
bient temperature in the unheated space but starts rising when the pipe
is heated from 14 or more out of 20 segments. The temperature in the
case of 20 out of 20 for a fully heated pipe is naturally constant at 938
C for all the segments and is consistent with the result obtained by the
method in EC3. This example shows the results of a steel pipe of only
4 m long. It is expected that the conclusion for the results is similar
even if the length of the pipe is a lot longer because any segments beyond
those at ambient temperature would have little or no effect on the results.
In practice, Fig. 4 is useful in determining the re protection require-
ments of a steel member under partial heating condition. For instance, a
conservative design requirement can be considered for limiting the pipe
temperature to a maximum of 400 C at which steel yield strength starts
to deteriorate according to EC3. If the pipe is heated for a length of 1.2 m
out of the 4 m (6 out of 20), from Fig. 4, insulation is required for a total
of 8 segments (1.6 m out of 4 m) beyond which the temperature is
below 400 C. When insulation is actually provided for these 8 seg-
ments, the temperatures in all segments will drop and, theoretically,
the number of segments requiring insulation will be even smaller. The
nal result can be obtained through an iterative nite difference analy-
sis with some of the segments protected with insulation. However, this
analysis is beyond the scope of the present study.
The temperature evolution of all the segments over the 60 min of
heating for a typical case of heating 4 out of the 20 segments is shown
in Fig. 5 where the re temperature curve is also shown. It can be seen
that all heated segments have a temperature evolution prole very

4.2. Case 1: pipe with t = 10 mm

The results of the analysis showing the maximum temperature at the

end of the 60 min heating period using the nite different scheme for all
heating scenarios are shown in Fig. 4. It can be seen that there is a smooth
temperature gradient from the rst segment to the last segment. It should
be noted that in all cases, the maximum temperature in the rst heated
segment is nearly the same as that, at 938 C, of the fully heated pipe
(20 out of 20). All heated segments have similar maximum temperature
except the heated edge segment next to an unheated segment. The
maximum temperature in the heated edge segment is almost the same
(at about 910 C) in all cases except when the pipe is fully heated. The
transitional change of the temperature between the heated edge seg-
ment and the rst segment at ambient temperature occurs over a small
length of about 8 segments in most cases except when the pipe is fully Fig. 4. Maximum temperature distribution for steel pipe with t = 10 mm at end of 60 min
(or almost) heated. This rapid drop in temperature indicates that the heating.
 M.B. Wong / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16
Fig. 5. Temperature evolutions for 4 out of 20 heated segments for pipe with t = 10 mm.
similar to a fully heated member. Therefore, it can be concluded for this
example that the maximum temperature of any heated segment at the
end of the 60 min heating can be calculated by treating it as if the pipe is
fully heated. For comparison purposes, the average temperature of the
pipe for this case is calculated using Eqs. (1) and (2) from the EC3 meth-
od. The results are shown in Fig. 6. It can be seen that the maximum
temperature is well over 700 C.
Fig. 6. Average temperature of a partially heated pipe of t = 10 mm.
Fig. 7. Maximum temperature distribution for steel pipe with t = 16 mm at end of 60 min
heating.
5
Fig. 8. Temperature evolutions for 4 out of 20 heated segments for pipe with t = 16 mm.
4.3. Case 2: pipe with t = 16 mm
For the same pipe with the same diameter under the same re expo-
sure condition, the rate of heat transfer to the pipe from the re depends
mainly on the thickness of the pipe. To examine the effect of the pipe
thickness on the temperature distribution of the steel pipe, the above
analysis is repeated with a pipe thickness of t = 16 mm, equivalent to
a section factor of 62.5 m1. Due to the reduction in section factor of
the pipe, it is expected that the overall temperature rise will be lower
than Case 1 above.
The maximum temperature distribution of the pipe is shown in
Fig. 7. It can be seen that while the maximum temperature in all cases
is slightly lower than the case for t = 10 mm, the behaviour is virtually
identical. The difference in temperature in any segment between the
two cases is b10 C. The temperature evolutions for all segments over
the 60 min of heating are shown in Fig. 8. However, when using the
EC3 method to calculate the average temperature of the pipe, it can be
seen from Fig. 9 that the maximum temperature at the end of the
60 min is 625 C, N100 C reduction on the case for t = 10 mm.
5. Conclusions
In this study, a nite difference scheme using a parametrically coded
generic element is proposed for the analysis of temperature distribution
of partially heated steel members. The main advantage of using this
method is to enhance computational efciency and reduce formulation
Fig. 9. Average temperature of a partially heated pipe of t = 16 mm.
6 M.B. Wong / Journal of Constructional Steel Research 128 (2017) 16

complications. It has been found that the method gives more accurate V volume per unit length
results for temperature distribution estimation of steel members than VV volume
the method provided by EC3. The results are useful in providing infor- cp specic heat of steel
mation on insulation requirements for steel members subject to partial density
heating in situations such as members passing through multiple re g re temperature
compartments or subject to localised res. The concept can be applied , , , parameters controlling boundary conditions
to other applications such as partially protected steel connections [6] res resultant emissivity of steel
and partially damaged re protections [7]. 5.67 108 W/m2 K4

Nomenclature
Q_ B rate of heat ow from upwind element References
Q_ C rate of heat ow to downwind element
[1] P.J. DiNenno, SFPE Handbook of Fire Protection Engineering, fourth ed. NFPA & SFPE,
Q_ f rate of heat ow from re USA, 2008.
Q_ e rate of heat ow to the ambient environment [2] EC3, EN 1993-1-2: Design of Steel Structures, Part 1.2: General Rules - Structural Fire
h_ net;c heat ux by convection Design, CEN, 2004.
h_ net;r
[3] J.I. Ghojel, M.B. Wong, Three-sided heating of I-beams in composite construction ex-
heat ux by radiation posed to re, J. Constr. Steel Res. 61 (2005) 834844.
k thermal conductivity [4] J.L.M. Hensen, A. Nakhi, Fourier and Biot Numbers and the Accuracy of Conduction
Ttx temperature in element x at time t ModellingProceedings of BEP '94 Conference Facing the Future 68 April 1994,
pp. 247256.
Ac cross-sectional area
[5] EC1, EN 1991-1-2: Actions on Structures Part 1.2: General Actions Actions on
As surface area subjected to re Structures Exposed to Fire, CEN, 2007.
t time interval, seconds [6] X.H. Dai, Y.C. Wang, C.G. Bailey, Effects of partial re protection on temperature de-
velopments in steel joints protected by intumescent coating, Fire Saf. J. 44 (3)
hc0 convective heat coefcient for ambient environment
(2009) 376386.
hc convective heat coefcient for re environment [7] M.M.S. Dwaikat, V.K.R. Kodur, A simplied approach for predicting temperature pro-
T0 surrounding temperature le in steel members with locally damaged re protection, Fire. Technol 48 (2012)
L segment length 493512.

L0 total length of member