Flammability of Elastomeric Materials

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Abstract
The use of synthetic polymeric materials in numerous consumer-oriented applications has increased rapidly over the past few decades. This trend has caused considerable concern regarding the responses of these materials to fire, and this concern has resulted in a flurry of activities by numerous agencies (private and government) directed toward better characterization of the flammability of manmade polymers as well as toward regulations to reduce any potential hazard these materials may present. As a consequence, the number of end uses for polymers requiring some degree of flame retardancy has risen sharply over the last several years. Much of the original action was in the field of plastics, and relatively little attention was paid to the flammability of elastomeric products. Even though the ignition and burning characteristics of rubbers were a matter of some concern in a few specific applications, the total volume of rubber used in these applications was rather small and, consequently, research on this subject lagged considerably behind the corresponding efforts spent in the field of plastics. The rapid increase in the use of elastomers in many consumer-oriented, nontire applications has, however, more recently caused greater emphasis to be placed on the flammability behavior of these polymer classes. The awakening interest in flammability characteristics of elastomer products is reflected in the sharp increase of published information on the subject over the last decades.

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