Universal evaluation of fire retardant properties of fiber mats by the optimal cone calorimeter

By using the optimal cone calorimeter, the universal method to study the fire retardant properties of fiber mats with different categories was explored. The challenge in obtaining accurate and repeatable cone calorimeter data was overcome from two aspects, employing a specific fixing mode and optimizing the measurement parameters. It was confirmed that the optimal grid covering rate of 25% and sample weight of 6 g favored repeatable and reliable data. With the improved cone calorimeter method, the reactions to fire of the selected fibers, involving the common and the inherent fire retardant fibers, are analyzed under different heat fluxes, in which the variations of time to ignition, the heat release rate and total heat release were compared. The fire retardant properties of various fiber mats were efficiently obtained by the improved cone calorimeter, which in turn verified its universality. In addition, the comparison between fire retardant properties and heat resistance of fibers demonstrated that the heat resistance is not the sole factor determining the fire retardant performance; the released fuel is much more important than the decomposition temperature. In conclusion, the universal evaluation method for combustion performance of fiber mats by the optimal cone calorimeter has been successfully established, which can serve as an efficient way in predicting the fire retardant properties of the corresponding fabrics.