Traditional experimental teaching is usually conducted only for a single course, ignoring the inherent, intrinsic connection of multiple courses and resulting in fragmented knowledge teaching, which wastes teaching and space resources. In reality, many issues are complex, and it is difficult for a single discipline to solve them comprehensively. Thus, multidisciplinary knowledge and methods must be thoroughly applied. In safety engineering, smoke control requires knowledge and theory from disciplines such as fluid dynamics, fire dynamics, and fire engineering. Therefore, interdisciplinary theory integration teaching is an innovative method to meet the needs of modern society and scientific and technological development, which has important educational significance and application value.

On the basis of the combination of safety engineering and control science engineering, this study developed a tunnel fire intelligent air curtain smoke control experimental teaching platform. It was based on the principle of proportional–integral–derivative (PID) automatic control, which met the theoretical and experimental comprehensive teaching needs of multiple professional courses in both majors. By adjusting the PID parameters, the response characteristics of the system under different settings can be observed. The individual roles and combined effects of the proportional, integral, and derivative controllers can be understood. Deeper insights into fire dynamics and fluid dynamics can be obtained by varying the fire heat release rate (HRR) and analyzing phenomena such as the flame tilt angle and temperature distribution. By adjusting the jet angle and velocity of the air curtain, changes in smoke spread can be observed, facilitating an understanding of the effects of air curtain smoke control.

This research found that when appropriate PID parameters were set (k_p = 0.1, k_i = 0.01, k_d = 0.05), the system not only maintained stability but also responded rapidly to environmental changes, achieving excellent control performance. The temperature distribution of the tunnel ceiling further illustrated that intelligent air curtains with varying jet widths and angles can effectively play a role in smoke control. With HRR from 5 to 25 kW, the air curtain jet velocity gradually increased with the enhancement in HRR but decreased with the increase in the air curtain width. As the jet angle of the air curtain increased, the horizontal velocity component acting on the flame became larger, resulting in a larger flame tilt angle. Within the range of 15° to 45°, a larger jet angle brought a better smoke control effect. The platform effectively demonstrated how automatic control principles combined with traditional air curtains can achieve intelligent smoke control in complex fire scenarios. Besides, the results showed that teaching based on this platform integrated theoretical knowledge, experimental operation, and data analysis.

The platform integrated PID automatic control principles with courses in safety engineering. It concretized abstract knowledge points such as fire smoke movement and stratification, smoke control, and automatic control principles, providing a multidisciplinary and integrated learning environment. Teaching methods based on this platform can significantly enhance the quality and effectiveness of experimental courses, effectively improve students’ ability to apply multidisciplinary knowledge comprehensively, and foster their innovative thinking and exploration skills. Overall, this interdisciplinary experimental teaching platform strongly supports modern educational reform and innovation, possessing important educational significance and practical value.