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Fire Extinguishing Agents for Protection of Occupied Spaces in Military Ground Vehicles

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Abstract

Historically the US Army used Halon 1301 (bromotrifluoromethane), a chemical with high ozone depletion potential (ODP), to protect the crews of armored vehicles from the effects of peacetime and combat fires. Since the phase-out of Halon production the US Army has directed that zero ODP materials be used wherever possible. Subsequently, major new vehicle platforms have been deployed with automatic fire extinguishing systems (AFES) that rely on HFC-227BC, a zero-ODP-agent blend of HFC-227ea (heptafluoropropane) and sodium-bicarbonate-based dry chemical. Unfortunately, hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) generally have high global warming potential (GWP)—thousands of times that of carbon dioxide on a weight basis. Hence, as part of a larger effort to reduce its carbon footprint, US Army Program Managers have asked that fire extinguishing agents that are more environmentally friendly be evaluated as part of ongoing vehicle modernization efforts. Several agents were investigated, including FK-5-1-12, water with additives, and dry chemicals. This report describes the findings of more than 150 live-fire tests using nine agents and four extinguisher technologies. The basic conclusion is that no alternate agent can yet be considered to be a practical replacement for Halon 1301 or HFC-227BC for this application. However, a blend of Halon 1301 and dry chemical has been found to be about twice as effective as Halon 1301 alone. Thus, pending confirmation tests on vehicles, it may be feasible to use less Halon in legacy systems without compromising fire protection performance.

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Notes

  1. ATC Chemistry reports: (a) 2009-CC-167A, (b) 2009-CC-222, (c) 2009-CC-227, (d) 2009-CC-359, (e) 2009-CC-825.

  2. Many current requirements are based on Ripple et al. [13]. The minimum oxygen level is found in Swanson [14]. Acceptable Noise Levels for this application are defined in section 6-2c(2) of [15].

  3. See for example [18] and the volume factor is discussed in Eckhoff [19].

  4. Dessicarb is described in [21].

  5. Potassium-bicarbonate-based dry chemical, also known as ‘Purple K’, is described in [24].

  6. The agent masses for a given agent were adjusted using the following iterative process: a starting mass was chosen and tested. If the test failed then the test was repeated with twice the agent mass. This was repeated until a pass was achieved or the maximum safe concentration was reached. Similarly, if the first test passed, then the agent mass was halved until a failure occurred.

  7. ATC Chemistry Report 2009-CC-016 reports June 2008 test results.

  8. See Table 4.1 in [26].

References

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  11. Waxman and Markey (Reps) (2009) American clean energy and security Act of 2009. US Congress, HR2454, 15 May 2009

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  26. Kim A, Crampton G, Kanabus-Kaminska M (2008) Evaluation of gas generator system with NOVEC 1230 agent as a replacement for crew compartment protection halon system. National Research Council Canada, Report B-4193.1, 31 March 2008 (See Table 4.1)

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  28. Hodges SE, McCormick SJ (2009) Evaluation of fire suppression agents for protection of occupied spaces in military ground vehicles. Proceedings of ground vehicle survivability symposium (GVSS), August 2009

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Acknowledgements

This program was funded by Ground Systems Survivability (GSS) at TARDEC and is a continuation of the work reported previously [28]. Valuable support and discussions with Ron Sheinson of the Naval Research Laboratory and Joe Senecal of United Technology Fire & Security are gratefully acknowledged. The excellent support of Aberdeen Test Center was crucial to completing these tests.

Disclaimer

Reference herein to any specific commercial company, product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or the Department of the Army (DoA). The opinions of the authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or the DoA, and shall not be used for advertising or product endorsement purposes.

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  1. US Army TARDEC, Alion Science and Technology, 2979 La Combadura, Santa Barbara, CA, 93105, USA

    Steven E. Hodges

  2. US Army TARDEC Ground Systems Survivability, 6501 E 11 Mile Rd, Warren, MI, 48397, USA

    Steven J. McCormick

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  1. Steven E. Hodges
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  2. Steven J. McCormick
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Correspondence to Steven E. Hodges.

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Hodges, S.E., McCormick, S.J. Fire Extinguishing Agents for Protection of Occupied Spaces in Military Ground Vehicles. Fire Technol 49, 379–394 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10694-012-0271-z

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