- Author
-
Ohlemiller, T. J.
- Title
- Influence of Flame-Retarded Resins on the Burning Behavior of a Heating, Ventilating and Air Conditioning Unit from a Sports Coupe.
- Coporate
- National Institute of Standards and Technology, Gaithersburg, MD
- Report
-
NISTIR 6748
April 2003
24 p.
- Distribution
- AVAILABLE FROM: National Technical Information Service (NTIS), Technology Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce, Springfield, VA 22161. Telephone: 1-800-553-6847 or 703-605-6000; Fax: 703-605-6900; Rush Service (Telephone Orders Only) 800-553-6847; Website: http://www.ntis.gov
- Keywords
-
automobile fires
|
resins
|
flame retardants
|
combustion
|
heating
|
ventilation
|
air conditioning
|
flammability
|
fire growth
|
polymers
- Abstract
- Three heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC) units from a sports coupe were tested in a vehicle buck. The three units had nominally identical, simulated crash damage. The three units differed in the polymer resin content of their shells. One was a normal, non-flame-retarded unit, as used in production vehicles. The other two units utilized a commercial flame-retarded polypropylene resin for non-fiber-filled shell components; they differed only in the flame-retardant content and resin type used in the glass fiber-filled portion of the HVAC case. In the test with the normal production unit, flames were visible within the portion of the unit inside the passenger compartment within 90 seconds of the start of the igniter; the heat release rate from the overall fire reached 2000 kW before being terminated 280 s into the test. With the two units made from flame-retarded resins, no evidence of flames was seen in the passenger compartment sections, and the growth of fire within the units was confined to the engine compartment components. Neither fire exceeded a heat release rate of the order of 5kW.