Fire safety testing services
Our expert teams, equipped with fully calibrated equipment and world-class facilities, offer a wide range of services from our UK-based, UKAS accredited, laboratories, to confirm that products or systems will perform as expected and/or demonstrate compliance with standards, including UK Building Regulations through British Standards (BS) and European Standards (EN).
Why work with BRE?
Ensuring that a product or system meets the highest level of performance is crucial. BRE has an unrivalled reputation, earned over decades of fire research and testing, for integrity, independence, and technical excellence. Our world-class facilities and expertise enable us to offer a range of independent testing and certification services, and develop bespoke experimental facilities tailored to specific project requirements.
How can BRE help you?
Our comprehensive range of fire safety testing includes LPCB third-party certification, Passive Fire Resistance testing, Reaction To Fire testing, Fire Suppression product testing, Structural Fire Engineering, Fire Risk Assessments, custom fire tests, compliance testing, and Fire Detection product testing. We also offer a range of loadbearing and non-loadbearing tests for systems including walls, floors, and ceilings.
LPCB third-party certification
We provide independent, third-party certification for a wide range of fire products and services through the internationally recognised Loss Prevention Certification Board (LPCB). Our status as a UKAS accredited laboratory reflects our competence and impartiality in this field.
For more information about LPCB third-party certification, please visit RedBookLive.
Passive Fire Resistance testing
We offer Passive Fire Resistance testing for a range of products including loadbearing and non-loadbearing walls, floors, ceilings, and partitions, doorsets and shutters, dampers and ducts, pipes and penetrations, intumescent paint and marine decks and bulkheads. We also test fire performance of external and internal cladding systems. We test to a range of standards including LPS 1107, LPS 1132, LPS 1158, LPS 1181 Part 1, LPS 1181 Part 2, LPS 1195 Part 1, LPS 1207, LPS 1208, LPS 1215, LPS 1501, LPS 1505, LPS 1581, LPS 1582, BS 8414 Part 1 & Part 2, BS 476-21, BS 476-22, EN 13381-3, and EN 13381-8.
Reaction To Fire testing
We offer Reaction To Fire testing to understand the characteristics of both new products and samples from existing buildings to determine their contribution to fire development and spread. Our expert teams provide regulatory testing of construction products, roof coverings, marine and rail materials, as well as dust explosivity testing. This includes single burning item, non-combustibility, small flame and bomb calorimeter tests for the BS EN 13501-1 classification. We also offer spread of flame, fire propagation, heat release and roof penetration tests for a variety of standards including BS 476, CEN/TS 1187 plus toxicity, and acid gas testing for cables.
Fire Suppression product testing
We test fire suppression products, systems and services, including but not limited to sprinkler systems, hoses, fire extinguishers, blankets and gaseous systems, to a range of standards including EN 12094, EN 12259, EN 3, LPS 1036, LPS 1039, LPS 1040, LPS 1041, LPS 1045, LPS 1048, LPS 1131, LPS 1148, LPS 1185, LPS 1186, LPS 1194, LPS 1204, LPS 1219, LPS 1223, LPS 1230, LPS 1236, LPS 1237, LPS 1239, LPS 1240, LPS 1258, LPS 1260, LPS 1261, LPS 1276, LPS 1283 and LPS 1301.
Structural fire engineering
We can offer a range of services including desktop assessments of proposed solutions, site inspections of existing structures and numerical modelling of the performance of structures under fire load conditions.
Regulatory and compliance testing
We provide UKAS accredited testing services to enable clients to demonstrate compliance with UK Building Regulations through British Standards (BS) and European Standards (EN). We also provide a wide range of testing services to a wider range of standards including International Standards Organisation (ISO) and Industry recognised protocols. Our testing services support our Certification and Approval services for Loss Prevention Standards (LPS), and United Kingdom Conformity Assessment (UKCA). We also provide testing services in support of CE marking and Marine Equipment programmes.
Fire Risk Assessments
The performance of a fire-resistant product, system or structural element needs to be shown to meet the relevant regulations. This is normally supported by conducting fire resistance tests. However, it is often impractical to test all the potential variants, or it is impossible due to their size and/or configuration. In these situations, it may be possible to provide a product assessment. This is written by an assessment engineer using existing test data and industry recognised guidance and rules, along with their own extensive knowledge and experience. The resulting report can evaluate a range of variables in the product or system construction and provide an opinion on the likely fire performance. BRE Global can provide specialised Fire Risk Assessments, based on our extensive fire safety experience.
Fire Detection product testing
We test fire detection and alarm products, systems and cables to a range of well-recognised industry standards including the EN 54 series, EN 14604, EN 50291, LPS 1020, LPS 1054, LPS 1259, LPS 1277, LPS 1282, LPS 1653, BS 6387, BS 7629-1, BS 7846, BS 8434-2, EN 50200 and EN 60702-1.
Following significant investment in our facilities, our current lead time for fire detection product testing is currently two weeks.
BRE facilities
We offer extensive, world-class facilities for fire safety testing, including:
- BRE’s Burn Hall, one of Europe’s largest dedicated facilities for fire performance, research, and testing, featuring smoke management for heat release rate determination
- Fully equipped Fire Resistance and Reaction To Fire laboratories and test rigs for standard and ad-hoc testing
- Loaded wall rig calibrated up to 1020kN
- Specialised column, vertical and horizontal furnaces for fire resistance testing
- External cladding (BS 8414) and sandwich panel performance (LPS 1181) test facilities
- Advanced modelling facilities
- 10 MW and 2 MW calorimeters with optional sprinkler protection
- Sprinkler performance and distribution test facility
- Ad hoc space for fire recreations and experiments
- Large-scale and intermediate-scale experimental rigs for various studies
- Analytical chemistry facilities for chemical species sampling
- Computational fluid dynamics and risk-based fire modelling suite
Get in touch
Our dedicated team is ready to provide a range of UKAS accredited services to support your fire safety testing needs, to confirm performance and compliance.
For more information, call us on +443333218811, email us at enquiries@bregroup.com or use the online form.