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Burning Issues With Banners
Note: This story is an addendum to the February 2007 Hingst’s Sign Post column, “Soft-sided Signage.” — Ed.
For interior applications, an FR grade of banner substrate is often required to comply with state and local fire codes. I was taught that FR is an Underwriter’s Laboratories (UL) classification, which stands for “flame-retardant.” However, I have heard many people say that the FR is an acronym for “fire-resistant” and “flame-resistant”.
Since banner materials are often used for interior applications—such as graphics for shopping malls, airports, museums, tradeshows and theatre performances—the fire resistance of these substrates is always a key consideration in material selection.
According to Avery Dennison’s Miles Clark, some banner materials are, by the nature of their construction, fire-resistant. Vinyl banners, for example, tend to burn less than a polyethylene substrate. For those banners materials that are not very fire-resistant, manufacturers have developed many different types of fire-retardant coatings for fabrics. Many of these coatings contain either bromide or antimony trioxide, which are effective flame-retardant agents.
Although there is no certification that pertains directly to hanging promotional materials, many manufacturers use the California State Fire Marshall Code as their benchmark for testing the flammability of their materials. The demanding California fire code requires tests to be conducted, according to the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) standard described in NFPA701, which are widely accepted industry test methods for textiles and films used in public places. (NFPA is a worldwide non-profit organization, which has developed codes and standards for fire safety.)
The NFPA701 testing is performed in a special flame cabinet. In these tests, the banner substrate is folded (like a drapery) and held over a burner. The person conducting the tests exposes the material to a burning flame for a prescribed period of time and then records how long the material burns, as well as how much time passes before any burning material is extinguished and drips to the floor of the cabinet. (The California State Fire Marshall Code also requires leech testing, which is a method for identifying flammable substances within a fabric or banner material.)
The flame-retardant characteristics of a textile and the ink used to print it are important considerations for fabric banners used in public places. Laura Maybaum, POP Market Segment Manager for Nazdar in Shawnee, Kansas, says, “For interior applications, we developed a flame-retardant ink that will provide the best opportunity for passing certification testing when printed on a fire-retardant substrate. Testing the burn characteristics of an ink is a complex process, because how that ink performs varies depending on the substrate. On one banner substrate, a heavy concentration of ink can help retard burning. On another banner, the same amount of ink may burn differently.”
In evaluating the performance of any ink and substrate combination, Nazdar recommends to first conduct certification testing on a particular unprinted banner. If certification passes, repeat certification testing on printed samples of that material.
—Jim Hingst
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