Assessment of the NASA Flammability Screening Test and Related Aspects of Material Flammability. Final Report. July 1989-June 1992.
Assessment of the NASA Flammability Screening Test and
Related Aspects of Material Flammability. Final Report.
July 1989-June 1992.
(648 K)
Ohlemiller, T. J.
NISTIR 4882; NASA CR-189226; 45 p. August 1992.
Sponsor:
National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Lewis
Research Center, Cleveland, OH
Available from:
National Technical Information Service
Order number: PB92-238591
Keywords:
flammability; fire safety; fire tests; flame spread;
heat release rate; ignitability; microgravity;
spacecraft fires
Abstract:
This final report summarizes the results of an
assessment of the NASA flammability screening test
(8060.1B) for materials to be used in manned spacecraft
interiors. A set of materials was examined using the
standard NASA test, a modified version of this test
which incorporated external radiation and NIST tests
which measure ignitability, rate of heat release and
opposed flow flame spread behavior. Materials passing
the standard NASA screening test showed widely varying
degrees of flammability enhancement when subjected to
external radiation (modified NASA test, NIST tests).
Since such radiation is implicit in many normal fire
scenarios, materials passing the standard NASA screening
test should not be treated as non-flammable. The
quantitative role of self-feedback of radiation remains
to be fully clarified; an apparatus to examine this
issue was built but no tests could be completed in the
allotted time. The rate of heat release from the
two-sided burning of thermally-thin materials was
quantitatively compared to that for one-sided burning;
this issue was believed to be at the heart of certain
anomalies in the earlier stages of this study. A
synegeristic enhancement of heat release rate was indeed
found for two-sided burning of three materials; two
simplified models account for the origin of this effect.
On the basis of this study, it is recommended that NASA
supplement their existing flammability screening test
with one that incorporates external radiation. It is
further recommended that this supplemental test in
normal gravity be correlated experimentally with a
similar test in micro-gravity.
Building and Fire Research Laboratory
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Gaithersburg, MD 20899