Intumescent Coatings

INTUMESCENT PAINTS FOR STRUCTURAL FIRE PROTECTION

• The most common use for intumescent paint in architecture is to provide an aesthetically pleasing finish on exposed structural steel members.

• Typical spray applied fireproofing provides a thick and spongey surface that requires a finished surround to hide and protect the steel member. Intumescent paint provides the same level of protection in a coating that looks like a thin layer of paint.

• The paint product is applied to the steel in layers as needed to generate the thickness that corresponds to the level of protection mandated by the building code. A final layer of intumescent paint is mixed with pigments that provide the desired finish colour for the steel.

• Intumescent coatings, referred to as intumescent paint, are used in buildings as a passive fire resistance measure. They can be applied to structural members as an aesthetically pleasing fireproofing product. The key feature of intumescents is that they expand significantly when exposed to high temperatures, such as those found in a fire. Some intumescent products can expand to more than 100-times the original thickness. As the product expands it becomes much less dense, which makes it act as in insulator that keeps the high temperatures away from structural members or protected openings.