- Author
-
Friedman, R.
|
Urban, D. L.
- Title
- Contributions of Microgravity Test Results to the Design of Spacecraft Fire Safety Systems. Technical Memorandum.
- Coporate
- NASA Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, OH
- Sponsor
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Washington, DC
- Report
-
NASA TM-106093; AIAA-93-1152,
March 1993,
- Distribution
- Available from National Technical Information Service
- Contract
- WU-323-53-62
- Book or Conf
- American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. AHS/ASEE Second (2nd) Aerospace Design conference. February 16-19, 1993,
Irvine, CA,
1-13 p.,
1993
- Keywords
-
reduced gravity
|
spacecraft
|
fire safety
|
aerospace safety
|
combustion products
|
extinguishing
|
flammability
|
smoke detectors
|
space statons
|
weightlessness
- Abstract
- Experiments conducted in spacecraft and drop towers show that thin-sheet materials have reduced flammability ranges and flame-spread rates under quiescent low-gravity environments (microgravity) compared to normal gravity. Furthermore, low-gravity flames may be suppressed more easily by atmospheric dilution or decreasing atmospheric total pressure than their normal-gravity counterparts. The addition of a ventilating air flow to the low-gravity flame zone, however, can greatly enhance the flammability range and flame spread. These results, along with observations of flame and smoke characteristics useful for microgravity fire-detection "signatures", promise to be of considerable value to spacecraft fire-safety designs. The paper summarizes the fire detection and suppression techniques proposed for the Space Station Freedom and discusses both the application of low-gravity combustion knowledge to improve fire protection and the critical needs for further research.