Ignition and flame propagation of electric cables in a laboratory‐scale gallery fire test

The authors have conducted a laboratory‐scale gallery fire test on eight different samples of electric cable in a horizontal airflow. The number of speciments and the distances between them on the trestle were varied for each test. As a result, it was found that both ignitability and flame‐propagation properties depended on the distance between the specimens as well as on their number. Such flammability properties obtained for each cable sample were also found to be considerably consistent with the critical oxygen index. In addition, it is proposed that the flammability should be classified largely into five categories in this laboratory‐scale gallery fire test for fire‐retardance evaluation of solid combustible materials such as electric cables.