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One‐sided flame spread phenomena of a thermally thin composite cotton/fiberglass fabric
Author(s) -
Kleinhenz Julie,
Ferkul Paul,
Pettegrew Richard,
Sacksteder Kurt R.,
T'ien James S.
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
fire and materials
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.482
H-Index - 58
eISSN - 1099-1018
pISSN - 0308-0501
DOI - 10.1002/fam.870
Subject(s) - flame spread , composite material , materials science , composite number , poison control , forensic engineering , engineering , combustion , chemistry , environmental health , organic chemistry , medicine
As an experimental necessity, past flame spread studies have relied on fast burning cellulosic papers. For the longer duration tests planned for the International Space Station a 50% fiberglass, 50% cotton composite fabric is better suited for the novel fuel feeding system in the compact hardware design of a current microgravity combustion experiment. The fabric's combustion characteristics in normal gravity include unexpected cases where a flame can be sustained on one side of the fuel. One‐sided flames are smaller in size than their two‐sided counterparts, and propagate at half the speed. Surface temperature distributions were measured using infrared imaging and indicated a high temperature region caused by the non‐flammable fiberglass. Breaching the fiberglass matrix made it possible for the flame to transfer to the other side of the fuel, suggesting that the fiberglass matrix acts as a flame arrester. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.