The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-02-28 00:00:00

WOOD v. IRON.

The following letter from Captain Shaw, the Chief Officer
of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade, has lAtIl cent to Ihe Times
for public ttlou
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Sir,—Before the public interest has subsided, as it will
soon do, front its usual spasmodic excitement after all
large fire., ani while the traditional nine days, though
rapidly drawing to • close, still loot, and leave a faint
hope that some useful imprensiou may be made by
what has Lapprned, perhaps you will allow me to take
the opportueity of relating a recent experience, which
may prove instructive to at least some of your readers.
A few mouths knee a fire occurred in one of the
enormous warehounes for which the docks of thin metrr-
polit are remarkable, and raged with great fury frem a
little before six o'clock in the morning until about eleven
in the forenoon, when it wan extinguished, and a very
large proportion of the building and its contents saved.
The warehouse was coostructed of brick walls; it
had wooden floors, supported on wooden beams, which
In their turn were carried on wooden storyopoeta about
12in. thick; and, although serious damage wag done,
not one portion of the heavy woodwork was destroyed.
After the tire I was allowed to remove one of the
etory-posta, with a section of the beanie and other
parts surrounding it above and below. This post had
been stNected to the full action of the tire during the
whole of its duratirm as already mentioned, or, making
full allowance for everything, incluiing the delay of
the fire attacking the particular spot on which it stood
and the time at which the cooling process commence°,
certainly not less than rq hours.
As we hail used large quantitiee of water, and it
wan probable that the wood might have been some-
what saturated. I bad it carefully dried for several
Mx) s before a strong fire, until not a trace of moisture
remained in it. .

I then set it on end in an open yard, exactly am it
had stood in the warehouse, with the pedestal under-
neath, the cap above, and the beam across the cap,
placed more than a ton of shavings, light wood, and
heavy wood r,.und it, and after saturating the whole
heap with petroleum applied a light to it. After this
I kept men pumping petroleum and turpentine on it
until my stock was exhausted.
At the end of 2ri hours I withdrew the post, beam,
and other parts from the fire, and within a fewminu,ss
from the time at which they were withdrawn they
cers,ed to burn. . . . . . .

I then sawed off horizontally a few feet at that part
which had cuff ered most from the flames, and afterwards
split the same longitudinally with steel wedges in order
to eximine its condition.
The post was of pitch pine, the most inlismmable
wood I know, and yet after exposure for seven hours
to fires the fury of which could not be exceeded except
hi blast furnaces, it contained, and still contains
within it a quantity of perfectly uninjured and appae
rently fresh wood, probably capable at this moment of
supp irting the whole weight which the original post
can have been designed to carry.
Immediately after the saw.cut, and again after the
cleaving with steel wedges, I carefully examined the
centre, and found it just perceptibly warm to the
touch, but nothing more, thus praying the fibre in
which the strength Iles must have been quite uninjured.
The lesson to be drawn frtan this 1 take to be as
follows : . .

A massive story-post of even the most Inflammable
wood is absolutely aud pet fectly proof againet any heat
which can be applied to ir, will not of itself burn at all,
but requires a a netinual enp,ely of highly inflammable
munstances to keep it burning, and, when this supply
in withdrawn, COMM to burn; and, lastly, after being
exposed for seven boars to flames of very great in-
tensity, is not injured to a greater depth than abut
two inches from the original outer surface, and atill
shows a centre as clean sod trunk as when it was first
put in.
There may be other materials suitable for this pur-
pose which are capable ot resisting the effects of heat,
and, if ao, I hope we may one day hear of them; but
in the meanwhile I venture toe abinit what I consider
to be strong practical teatimo_iy in favour of massive
timber for the internal supporta of heavily loaded
buildings.
Metropolitan Fire Brigade, Chief Station,
Watling-IW%, LC, Feb. 21.

Alexander Peebles, A ELBA., architect, and one of
the cllstrlct surveyors under the Ifetropollso Buildings
Acts of 1855, unoer date 1, Walbroek-hulloines, Mend°,
house, Feuruary 21, has scut the following communicutiou
to The Tunes:—
-

" truit the great importance of this subject will be
considered a eutticient excuse for addresdng to you a
few practical observations and suggestions, supple-
mental to my letter published in your columns upon
the 19 ii lost., in which I pointed out the provisions
of the Metropolitan Buildings Act for limiting the
extent and contents of buildincs of the Pantechnicon
or warehouse class, and suggested that no openims
whatever should be permitted in the party walls be-
tween the compartments of much a building. The neces-
city for alletl a prohibition has since been amply proved
by the report of the foreman of the Fire Brigade who first
arrived and fonn I the iron doors not only open, but the
doorways themselves, occupied by goods, thuil preventing
the clueing of the doors and showing it Ira, not cus-
tomary to do se. Were this suggestion and the follow-
ing carried out a fire of any ex eat would be simply an
impessibility :-1. No fireplame or stover to be per-
mitted in any such building, but where heat is neces-
sary it ehould be supplied by means of hot air rarefied
in a chamfer external to the building, to which it
should be conveyed by small floes or pipes, so con-
structed as to prevent by any chance the passage of
flame. 2. Should any circumstance render an open
fireplace a necessity it eh mid lie provided with a steel
coiling shutter in one sheet, which by being drawn
down would close the opening and prevent any draught.
3. Where practicable the floors should be composed
of bricks f sufficient thickness and concreted to form
the floors; that where supports are required they
should be of brickwork, or If iron be necessarily
employed-1 do not like its nee, but fear it can-
not always be obviated—it should be as stanchions,
+ shaped, thick in substance, and amply pro.
tected by fire clay or bricks, some of which I am
informed have for 36 hours resisted the effects of a
white heat that fused iron in fifteen minutes, and balks
of timber be preferred to iron joists, as such, when
bedded in brickwork, cannot burn, but only char upon
the exposed surface. 4. That where timber floors are
used they should be made stronger and their full
thickness pugged with concrete, which would for a
considerable time prevent the joists burning, their
under sides being only charred, and water thrown on
them produces no such effect as upon iron. 5. The
staircase should be completely enclosed in brick
walls and the openings fitted with iron doors;
this would to some extent prevent the stair-
ca3e acting as it tumidly does to communicate
the fire from one story throughout the building.
6. The number of doors, windows, and apertures in
external walls should be as few as possible, and all
such fitted externally with wroughi-iron shutters
stoutly ribbed or stayed with 'l' irons to prevent
buckling under any ordinary heat to which they are
likely to be exposed, and fitted in rebated frames.
Those shutters to be worked from the street, the
object being in the event of a tire occurring if net
then cloeed, they could be readily and immediately
shut, and exclude the draught, for such open-
I rgs supply the draught which fans the flames.
A fire could scarcely exist In a building thus con-
structed, or at the very least its progress would
be so embed and checked that the Fire Brigade
could easily deal with it. With regard to dwelling-
houses, they might be rendered fire resisting for
some time, at all events for a eutficient period to
effect the escape of the inmates, by-1, enclosing the
staircase from the ground to the root, and through it,
with brick walls; 2, placing upon the outside of each
doorway below the bedrooms a steel self icoiling shutter
in one piece ; these shutters in no way mar the appear-
ance of a house, as durhig the c'a) time they are c Ted
up out of eight, and are easily drawn down ; and 3, by
welt pugging between the j lets with iteo.indbustiriie
materials, which, in addition to the protection it would
afford from fire, would make the home warmer and
quieter, as footsteps overhead would not be audible."

Mr. Julius Six also writes to The Times :—" In re-
ference to the subject of detecting fire by electrical
agency, as submitted to the Board of Works, it is a
matter of surprise and regret that such a sure and
simple method of detection should not be more publicly
known and emptoyed for the protection of life and
property. From an experience of 15 years in fitting
these appliances in buildings I can confidently assert,
that, with the instruments brought to their present
slate of perfection, a certain and unerring warning of

Imm, I -

any nneafo increase of temperature woull he
tliattly vireo. As an Inetam:e, the tire which broke
on at the soot of the Doke of Northernherleed at
Albnry Park, Surrey, in the year 1869, was timely
.1 ec,ered throneh the ringing of the electric belle, as
r, bared t, in The Times of May 4, 1869„"