EXAP for fire class – FO cables
▪ Europacable prepared a proposal of EXAP rules for FO cables, based on 66 cable types from different families
▪ Rules have been worked out which are close to the specific EXAP rules for power cables and which lead to the correct classification in 98% of all analyzed cases
▪ These rules shall become part of the TS 50576. On the next meeting of the GNB on 2015-10-08, most probably a resolution will be made so that Notified Bodies can apply these rules already subsequent to the meeting.
▪ Scope:
• For fire classes B2, C, D and E
• For smoke production s1, s2, s3
• NOT for cables wit a diameter < 5 mm
▪ Family definition (original text):
• A family of cables is a specific range of products of the same general construction and varying only in number of optical fibres and number of units. The specific family shall be produced by the same manufacturer using the same materials and the same design rules based on national or international standards, and/or company standards
• Hereby, a unit is defined as a combustible tubular item which may contain one or several fibres. The optical fibre with an outer diameter of approximately 250 μm is not considered a unit, nor is the outer jacket of the cable. A tubular item is not considered a unit if it contains other units.
• Examples of units can be; tight buffered fibre, microbundle, flextube, unitube and loose tube.
• The number of tubes attempt to describe the same feature as the number of tubular insulations around the conductors in a power cable.
▪ Family definition (original text):
• The following properties are considered to have a negligible influence on the fire behaviour and therefore differences in these properties only do not necessarily imply that cables belong to different families:
− Fibre glass type
− Fibre type (single mode or monomode)
− Fibre colour
− Outer jacket colour
− Printing |
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