1992

Björkman, Jouni; Keski-Rahkonen, Olavi

Spontaneous ignition of materials is a significant fire hazard in many cases especially in industry and trade. Conventional methods for determining the self-ignition temperature have been based on heating materials at a constant temperature. Temperatures are estimated by trial and error, and iteration of the measurements is continued until accurate enough results are obtained. This method is time consuming and expensive to carry out. In this paper a new method for measuring the self-ignition temperature by heating the specimen continuously is proposed and tested. The defined mathematical conditions for optimization of heating parameters give the basis of an algorithm for computer based oven control. Experimental results have also been produced that can be seen to support the validity of the algorithm.