Burning Behavior of Bamboo Crib Fires

The expanding application of bamboo materials and scaffolding in construction has brought the issue of its fire safety to the forefront. However, current research on charring solid combustion has predominantly focused on wood, while systematic studies on bamboo remain limited. To address this gap, a series of burning tests were conducted to compare the combustion dynamics of bamboo and wood cribs of identical dimensions. Parameters including mass loss rate, flame height, flame temperature, and radiant heat flux were measured for comparative analysis. Bamboo combustion is typically characterized by a rapid flareup followed by a sharp decay in flame height and temperature during the initial and final stages, respectively, which results in a total burning time markedly shorter than that of wood (e.g., 28% shorter in Test P 3 ). The bamboo crib fire demonstrated significantly more aggressive combustion behavior than its wood counterpart. Specifically, it exhibited 22%–39% higher peak mass loss rate, 3%–27% higher peak flame height, and approximately 10% higher peak temperature compared to wood. The available models for mass loss rate and flame height were assessed against experimental data from bamboo crib fires. Furthermore, a solid flame radiation model was developed to predict the radiant heat flux from the bamboo crib fires, with predictions agreeing with experimental measurements within 20% error. The model's limitations were identified by comparing its predictions with the experimental measurements.