Experimental study on fire extinguishing with a newly prepared multi-component compressed air foam

A multi-component compressed air foam system (MCAFS) was developed with newly prepared multi-component foaming agents. Extinguishing of wood crib and oil pool fires was performed under different conditions, such as foam concentration, mixing chamber forepart structure and working pressure. It was found that the foam concentration had sufficient effects on fire extinguishing efficiency, and an optimized concentration value exists. For instance, for diesel oil pool fires, this value is about 2.2% while it is about 4.0% for wood crib fires. The results also show that the system with a coaxial mixing chamber has greater efficiency than a T-shape. The effects of working pressure on fire extinguishing are evident in experiments, i.e., the higher the working pressure is, the more readily the fire is extinguished. Supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 50774072), National Key Technology R&D Program (No. 2006BAK06B07) and Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University (No. NECT-07-0794)