Fire hazard associated with passenger cars and vans: Fid-Bau Portal

Fire hazard associated with passenger cars and vans

Hirschler, M.M. / Hoffmann, D.J. / Hoffmann, J.M. / Kroll, E.C.

Fire statistics indicate that more than 1 in every 12 US fire fatalities occurs in a passenger road vehicle. A number of recent accidents and fire tests have shown that there are severe fire problems associated with passenger cars and vans. It has long been known that materials in car interiors only need to meet a horizontal flame spread rate of 102 mm/min, when tested according to FMVSS 302, a test inadequate to predict fire hazard. More recently it has also been found that the 'engine cover' is usually totally inadequate to prevent the penetration of a small fire from the engine compartment into the passenger compartment and does not have to meet any fire resistance requirements. A third area of concern is the fire performance of the electrical cables used. In this work, fire tests were conducted on several materials and combinations, from passenger cars, reasonably representative of the type of materials contained in the vehicles tested, with the emphasis on applications as: engine cover, HVAC ducting, headliner, seating and cables. Small scale fire tests were conducted in the cone calorimeter, in FMVSS 302 and in a typical vertical orientation. Three full scale tests were also conducted using actual cars, and the experience of some real-life car accidents was analyzed. Test results indicate that the fire performance of most of the car materials tested was, at best, mediocre. Moreover, the fire hazard consequence of the data analysis is that flashover in a passenger vehicle interior does not require large ignition sources. In fact, even very small ignition sources can result in fire quickly penetrating into the passenger compartment and generating a situation where the fire severely hinders (or even prevents) passenger escape or rescue.