With the advent in technology our life style has changed dramatically. We have changed our work place and living patterns. We are living a much more comfortable life with the technology gadgets but these gadget which have made of life easy also possess the tendency to take our lives. With our new state of the art buildings equipped with new breath taking technologies we are more prone to fatal fire out breaks. Our buildings are webbed with commination cables which can turn into a fire conductor if proper measures are not taken into consideration by the manufacturers.
There are cable producers who are manufacturing communications cable that does not pass fire and life-safety building codes and yet they label it with all the marketing you need on the proper testified cables.
The communication cables are tested in Steiner Tunnel, in which cables are tested by being subjected to fire. A cable earns the plenum rating by passing specific flame-spread and smoke-generation requirements in a Steiner Tunnel. Cables are subjected to a tunnel and fire is then initiated at one end and then technicians measure how far does the fire reaches in the cable.
First fire onset is measured by the control cable whose manufacture is known to be proper and safe and then a cable without UL approved holograph label was subjected to fire which burnt rapidly and produced dense smoke. So when you are installing the cables in your building make sure you are using the right UL approved cables which are designed to with stand fire out breaks.