It is necessary to predict the activation time of fire detectors accurately to improve the reliability for evaluating the required safe egress time (RSET) in performance-based fire safety design. In this study, problems of the plunge test, which is widely applied in assessing fire detectors, were examined through experiments and numerical simulations. In addition, a new shield-cup test method was proposed to address these problems. A fire detector evaluator (FDE) developed in a previous study was applied to ensure measurement accuracy and reproducibility. During the plunge tests, a significant measurement error was observed in the activation time of the smoke detector because of the rapid flow change when the detector was input. However, during the shield-cup tests, slight changes occurred in the flow inside the FDE when the detector as exposed to smoke. In conclusion, the proposed shield-cup test method is expected to be useful for evaluating the response characteristics of fire detectors more accurately in simulated fire environments.