ARGE joins EDSF Symposium on “Fire & Smoke“

EDSF deals with fire resistance requirements for emergency exits and doors on escape routes. It mirrors the work of TC/127/WG3 where EXAPs are produced. These are application documents evaluating the fire resistance of those door- shutter / hardware combinations, which are not covered by the product standards. The EXAPS are also standards of origin supporting the product standards. They are of great importance for the doors and shutters and possibly also for the hardware industry in order to minimize the necessity of fire-testing.

The main issues of the conference were:
– Introduction of the CPR (becomes mandatory in 2013) and its influence for the manufacturers.

Note: The manufacturers will have to present a “Declaration of Performance” document, DoP where the mandated product characteristics will have to be declared.

– The interchange ability of products when it comes to fire testing

Note: This will be advised by the EXAPs that is why those documents are important for our industry!

– Comparability of test results of fire testing, minimisation of testing

Note: For the time being, the test results differ from one test house to another. This leads to the situation that everybody is going to the institute promising the “best” possible results. EDSF will produce a WG dealing with the comparability of testing and a fair competition of testing institutes.

Furthermore, the main objectives of the EDSF have been summarized and it had been pointed out, that EDSF is an important contact for the Commission Services.

For a detailed memo outlining these issues in more detail contact the General Secretary via email at j.kieker@arge.org