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Feature
The ever expanding requirements of fire
safety and environmental protection call
for new materials all the time, and they
appear.
Scarcely is an innovative fluoropolymer
inducted into the pantheon of fire-
retardant
materials
than
another
compound promises enhancement.
It is nothing less than remarkable how
accustomed we have become to the
periodic arrival of new vigilante materials;
and how dependably — almost how
casually — they deliver.
Consider a term in common use: ‘flame-
retardant wire or cable.’ Then consider
the definition of flame-retardant wire or
cable: ‘an electrical conductor capable
of maintaining integrity when exposed
to open-flame temperatures of 1,000° F
without propagating a fire or resulting
in falling burning particles or generating
large volumes of smoke.’
That is the profile of a super product.
The exhaustive work of invention and
testing has yielded a conductor (or
multiple conductors) covered by a layer
of primary insulation; then by a layer of
silicone rubber; then by a layer, or more
than one, of glass fibre.
There follows another layer of silicone
rubber, itself covered by braided asbestos
impregnated with a material to curb
swelling. Or, the second layer of silicone
rubber may be wrapped with asbestos
tape which is then covered by a layer of
elastomericmaterial. The experimentation,
for ever-higher values of fire-retardancy,
never stops.
We take products like these for granted
because we can. Those who have made
their careers in a category of the wire
and cable industry uniquely responsible
for the preservation of life and property
enable us to do so.
EuroWire – March 2008
Fire Safety Materials
206
The super products!