The Best Fire-Resistant Materials, Their Pros, and Cons

Nowadays, most engineers and architects plan, design, and build properties that ensure occupants remain safe whenever a fire outbreak happens. In this guide, we’ll cover the best fire-resistant materials, their pros, and their cons.

Let’s get started!

Stones

Stones work well in hilly places where you can access them with less hassle. Also, the market has different stones you can use at different places, but this depends on the stones’ characteristics. For example, you can use polished granites as tabletops and cladding for house columns and walls.

Also, you can use stones to build your compound wall, use them in a home’s entrance hallway or in the backyard garden. Moreover, you can build the walls using limestone, sandstone, or granite. Go for state stones if you’re looking for the best ones to use on your floors or roofs.

Another thing to note about stones is that they can withstand up to 1300 to 1500 degrees Celsius of temperature. However, stones cannot resist sudden cooling cases and break down into pieces.

For example, if you expose granite to excessive heat, it’ll crumble to cracks/sand and break down into pieces with several disintegration and explosion cases. Also, it’s not recommended to use limestone because fire effects can crumble and ruin it.

The compact sandstone features top-notch resistance against fire cases than limestone because it can sustain exposure to moderate fire cases without serious cracks. However, this will depend on the temperatures you expose these stones to.

Bricks

Most people from different parts of the world use bricks when constructing their homes. Here, bricks play a pivotal role in constructing house walls, damp roof cases, lintel and arch, retaining wall, and cavity walls. Besides this, bricks help a lot to give a property an aesthetic appearance.

First-class bricks fall under fireproof materials because of their ability to withstand fire exposure for an extended period. Besides this, bricks can sustain extreme temperatures of not more than 1300 degrees celsius without serious fire effects.

Fire bricks perform well when used in constructing fire-resistant walls because their melting point stands at around 2800 degrees celsius. However, note that the degree of brick fire resistance relies on factors, such as the construction method, brick clay composition, brick size, and more.

Though bricks feature their structural restrictions for application in buildings, researchers have proved brick masonry to be the perfect option for safeguarding homes against wildfires.

Steel

Steel performs well when used in constructing high-rise, residential structures. You can use this material in your house ceiling, beam, walls, lintel purlin, and more. Besides this, you can use steel in constructions as interior duction and heating and cooling system.

Moreover, steel performs when applied in internal fittings or internal fixtures like shelving, stairs, and rails. Steel is a non-combustible and fire-resistant material with a low fire-resistance rating. This feature explains why steel gets softened, reducing the resistance rating when exposed to high temperatures.

At high temperatures of approximately 600 degrees celsius, steel’s strength is cut off to around 1/3 of its reading under standard temperatures. Also, note that steel melts at 1400 degrees Celcius.

Cast Iron & Wrought Iron

Wrought iron works as a decorative material used in railing, fences, gates, and stairs. On the other hand, cast iron plays a pivotal role in creating sanitary fittings, such as sewer pipes, water pipes, and manholes. Besides this, you can use cast iron to make column bases and metal columns.

You’re likely to observe that wrought iron acts the same way as steel when exposed to fire, but this material features lesser elasticity and covers tension and compression strength. Most people don’t prefer cast iron for building fire-resistant homes because of its nature of cooling suddenly, getting contracted, and breaking down into fragments/pieces.