Study On Combustion And Smoke Production Properties Of Typical Upholstered Seat Materials

Because of its comfort and refineness,upholstered seats is all over the passenger car,office,home,recreation room and other places.However,upholstered seat materials are easy to be ignited,and it will release a lot of heat and smoke in the event of a fire,which will bring large fire risk to our life.Investigations on characteristics of combustion and smoke production of upholstered seat materials have not been conducted intensively in previous research.Cone calorimeter test and NBS smoke density chamber test were conducted respectively to study the characteristics of combustion and smoke production of polyurethane foam/artificial leather assembly,polyurethane foam/chemical fibre assembly and polyurethane foam/nylon assembly,which are made of typical upholstered seat materials.The effects of heat flux on combustion characteristics of typical upholstered seat materials were investigated.Thermally thin heating model is suitable for the three kinds of assemblies,and polyurethane foam/artificial leather assembly has better heat resistance than the other two,while polyurethane foam/nylon assembly has longer ignition time and higher critical heat flux for ignition.Heat release rate curves of the three kinds of assemblies show that,when polyurethane foam/artificial leather assembly is fully burnt,its heat release rate occurs two growth peaks,which are respectively caused by the main combustion process of the covering fabric of artificial leather and the polyurethane foam filler.However,there is only one growth peak for polyurethane foam/chemical fibre assembly and polyurethane foam/nylon assembly.In addition,the fire hazards of the three kinds of assemblies were evaluated through coupling parameters,indicating fire risk is different in different conditions,therefore fire risk evaluation needs to be considered with comprehensive factors.The effects of heat flux and pilot flame on characteristics of smoke production of upholstered seat materials were investigated.Pilot flame has a significant impact on combustion of the three kinds of assemblies under heat flux of 25 kW/m~2.All the assemblies were ignited by pilot flame,and the combustion runs faster and releases less smoke than the condition without pilot flame.However,pilot flame has little effect on combustion of the three kinds of assemblies under heat flux of 50 kW/m~2.