Burn‐through resistance of fibre/felt materials for aircraft fuselage insulation blankets

Light‐weight fire barrier materials for aircraft thermal/acoustical insulation blankets were investigated. The burn‐through test on blankets inserted with these fire‐blocking materials was performed using a small‐scale kerosene burner apparatus. The burner system generated a turbulent flame at 1000°–1100°C and a front heat‐flux at 160–180 kW/m 2 . The rear or back‐side heat flux of blankets and their corresponding burn‐through time were monitored by a computerized data acquisition system. The blankets with ceramic or polymeric fire barrier materials provided a significantly additional burn‐through time compared with the regular blankets. Blanket samples inserted with an alumino‐silicate‐based ceramic layer were not burned‐through after 6 min. For fire resistant polymeric‐based materials, the burn‐through time varied from 2 to 6 min. The burn‐through resistance was correlated with the stable structure of SiO 2 at high temperature for the ceramic sheets and with the formation of a char layer for polymeric layers.Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.