A new single-layered skin simulant and its comparison with the copper sensor for burn injury evaluation of thermal protective clothing

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to study the heat transfer effect of copper sensor and skin simulant on skin.Design/methodology/approachFor the sensor, the physical and mathematical models of the thermal sensors were used to obtain the definite conditions in the heat transfer process of the sensor, and the heat transfer models of the two sensors were developed and solved respectively by using ANSYS WORKBENCH 19.0 software. The simulation results were compared with the experimental test results. For the skin, the numerical model of the skin model was developed and calculated. Finally, the heat transfer simulation performance of the two sensors was analyzed.FindingsIt is concluded that the copper sensor is more stable than the skin simulant, but the material and structure of the skin simulant is more suitable for skin simulation. The skin simulant better simulates the skin heat transfer. For all the factors in the model, the thermal properties of the material and the heat flux level are the key factors. The convective heat transfer coefficient, radiation heat transfer rate and the initial temperature have little influence on the results, which can be ignored.Research limitations/implicationsThe results show that there are still some differences between the experimental and numerical simulation values of the skin simulant. In the future, the thermal parameters of skin simulant and the influence of the thermocouple adhesion should be further examined during the calibration process.Practical implicationsThe results suggest that the skin simulant needs to be further calibrated, especially for the thermal properties. The copper sensor on the flame manikin can be replaced by the skin simulant with higher accuracy, which will be helpful to improve the accuracy of performance evaluation of thermal protective clothing.Social implicationsThe application of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) technology can help to analyze the heat transfer simulation mechanism of thermal sensor, explore the influence of thermal performance of thermal sensor on skin simulation, provide basis for the development of thermal sensor and improve the application system of thermal sensor. Based on the current research status, this paper studies the internal heat transfer of the sensor through the numerical modeling of the copper sensor and skin simulant, so as to analyze the effect of the sensor simulating skin and the reasons for the difference.Originality/valueIn this paper, the sensor itself is numerically modeled and the heat transfer inside the sensor is studied.

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Thermal insulating and fire-retarding behavior of treated cotton fabrics with a novel high water-retaining hydrogel used in thermal protective clothing

Cellulose ◽

10.1007/s10570-021-03696-y ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Zhicai Yu ◽

Jinru Liu ◽

Abhijeet Suryawanshi ◽

Hualing He ◽

Yushu Wang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Protective Clothing ◽

High Water ◽

Cotton Fabrics ◽

Thermal Insulating ◽

Thermal Protective Clothing

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Protective performance of thermal protective clothing assemblies exposed to different radiant heat fluxes

Fibers and Polymers ◽

10.1007/s12221-016-5656-z ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 17 (5) ◽

pp. 809-814 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

V. K. Kothari ◽

S. Chakraborty

Keyword(s):

Protective Clothing ◽

Radiant Heat ◽

Heat Fluxes ◽

Thermal Protective Clothing ◽

Protective Performance

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A categorization tool for fabric systems used in firefighters' clothing based on their thermal protective and thermo-physiological comfort performances

Textile Research Journal ◽

10.1177/0040517518809055 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 89 (16) ◽

pp. 3244-3259 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Sumit Mandal ◽

Simon Annaheim ◽

Andre Capt ◽

Jemma Greve ◽

Martin Camenzind ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Performance Index ◽

Protective Clothing ◽

High Performance ◽

Clustering Algorithm ◽

Health And Safety ◽

Thermal Protective Performance ◽

Thermal Protective Clothing ◽

Low Performance ◽

Fabric System ◽

Protective Performance

Fabric systems used in firefighters' thermal protective clothing should offer optimal thermal protective and thermo-physiological comfort performances. However, fabric systems that have very high thermal protective performance have very low thermo-physiological comfort performance. As these performances are inversely related, a categorization tool based on these two performances can help to find the best balance between them. Thus, this study is aimed at developing a tool for categorizing fabric systems used in protective clothing. For this, a set of commercially available fabric systems were evaluated and categorized. The thermal protective and thermo-physiological comfort performances were measured by standard tests and indexed into a normalized scale between 0 (low performance) and 1 (high performance). The indices dataset was first divided into three clusters by using the k-means algorithm. Here, each cluster had a centroid representing a typical Thermal Protective Performance Index (TPPI) value and a typical Thermo-physiological Comfort Performance Index (TCPI) value. By using the ISO 11612:2015 and EN 469:2014 guidelines related to the TPPI requirements, the clustered fabric systems were divided into two groups: Group 1 (high thermal protective performance-based fabric systems) and Group 2 (low thermal protective performance-based fabric systems). The fabric systems in each of these TPPI groups were further categorized based on the typical TCPI values obtained from the k-means clustering algorithm. In this study, these categorized fabric systems showed either high or low thermal protective performance with low, medium, or high thermo-physiological comfort performance. Finally, a tool for using these categorized fabric systems was prepared and presented graphically. The allocations of the fabric systems within the categorization tool have been verified based on their properties (e.g., thermal resistance, weight, evaporative resistance) and construction parameters (e.g., woven, nonwoven, layers), which significantly affect the performance. In this way, we identified key characteristics among the categorized fabric systems which can be used to upgrade or develop high-performance fabric systems. Overall, the categorization tool developed in this study could help clothing manufacturers or textile engineers select and/or develop appropriate fabric systems with maximum thermal protective performance and thermo-physiological comfort performance. Thermal protective clothing manufactured using this type of newly developed fabric system could provide better occupational health and safety for firefighters.

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