Ipe Wood Decking Fire Rating

The ipe will darken slightly with the application of the decking oil but will not stain the wood.

Ipe wood decking fire rating.

Q i thought that ipe decking had a class a fire rating making it suitable for use in places such as the urban wildland interface areas prone to wildfire typically a concern in the arid west and on urban high rise rooftop decks. Ipe although it s not class a fire rated does operate similar to a class a fire rating because it won t easily catch on fire and the density will allow it to stay structurally sound longer in case you need to walk on the deck to get away from the fire. Our ipe decking exceeds the americans with disabilities act requirements for static coefficient of friction in a wet. A class a fire rating means that in testing ipe wood had a smaller flame spread than other woods and took more time to catch on fire.

Ipe wood decking received the highest classification for flame spread. In fact ipe wood offers a class a fire rating the highest fire rating a construction product can receive. The only wood that really can handle fire to any significant degree is ipe. With this rating ipe wood meets the building code requirements in many west coast states where class.

Basically it s a naturally non combustible material. Ipe wood decking is the gold standard for all hardwoods. Here is a table that shows the ratings given to ipe decking from the national fire protection agency note there are other third party certification companies that show similar results. Fire rating for ipe decking.

Question answer does ipe have a class a fire rating. Ipe decking flame spread 10 minutes. Inhibitor will prevent your deck from fading in the sun. You may also hear of claims about it having the same fire class rating as concrete.

If you are not already familiar with this material it is an exotic hardwood from south america and it is one of the hardest toughest most insect and rot resistant wood on earth. At the time the metrics used to test fire spread were far less stringent than they are today and ipe was given a class a rating the same rating. What makes ipe so great is that this wood is naturally fire bug and water resistant. Generally inorganic materials such as brick or tile are class a rated and most whole wood products are class b or c.

Tested by the national fire protection agency astm e84. Ipe also won t transfer heat from the bottom of the board to the top like the other decking. Plastic and composite decking is very hot and can create a fire hazard if installed outside a uv reflecting window. Results will vary based on the moisture content origin and species.

Interestingly enough ipe wood has up to a class a fire rating for flame spread. Up to class a uniform building code class 1. Wood is the best decking material for disbursing heat making the deck cooler to walk on and ipe also has a similar fire rating to concrete.