Prediction of Burn Injuries during Testing of Special Protective Clothing for Firefighters at the Thermomanequin Test Bench



Annotation:

Ensuring safety of the personnel when exposed to thermal factors of a fire, including through the use of various types of special protective clothing, is an important component of the firefighter occupational safety. Quality control of special protective clothing of the firefighters takes place in several stages. The final stage is to conduct tests on the Thermomanequin test bench when the workwear is in the working position on a full-size manequin, and it is exposed to the radiation heat flow and open flame. During the tests, the thermal parameters of the undersuit space are monitored — the temperature on the dummy surface and the passing heat flux. To measure the parameters of the thermal state of the undersuit space during the experiment at the Thermomanequin test bench, a special program was developed that allows the results (temperature and heat flow) to be displayed on a computer monitor in real time in tabular, graphical forms, as well as in the form of a color fill on the monitor on the body of the manequin. The program and the results of tests conducted at the test bench do not allow predicting burn injuries. For the possibility of conducting experiments on predicting burn injuries at the Thermomanequin test bench, according to the international standards requirements, the program for calculating burn injuries based on the values of the passing heat flow, interfaced with the programs for measuring the passing heat flow, was developed. The developed program allows using experimental data on heat fluxes from the sensors, to calculate non-stationary temperature fields; by the temperatures at the boundaries of the conjugation of the epidermis with the dermis and the dermis with the subcutaneous tissue, calculate the reduced parameter of the burn injury and determine the time to reach the values at these boundaries that characterize the occurrence of the second and third degree burns respectively.

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DOI: 10.24000/0409-2961-2021-10-21-26
Year: 2021
Issue num: October
Keywords : test bench special protective clothing heat flux temperature pain threshold burn injury calculation programs
Authors:
  • Loginov V.I.
    Dr. Sci. (Eng.), Chief Research Associate, loginovvlad@mail, FGBU VNIIPO of EMERCOM of Russia, Balashikha, Russian Federation
  • Arkhireev K.E.
    Department Head FGBU VNIIPO EMERCOM of Russia, Balashikha, Russia
  • Ignatova I.D.
    Senior Research Assistant FGBU VNIIPO EMERCOM of Russia, Balashikha, Russia
  • Nekrasov D.A.
    Cand. Sci. (Eng.), Deputy Dean Moscow Polytechnic University, Moscow, Russia