All fashionable clothing is combustible. But, of course, that does not make all clothing unsafe. Short and sweet all in a row.

The most unsafe is clothing that is loose-fitting (airy) and made of easily combustible materials.

Because it is difficult to take everything into account at once, the rules have been kept simple. This was already the case in America and has been adopted with us: all substances must meet a simple minimum requirement.

All normal fabrics must comply with:
1. at 1 second flame contact time, flame displacement slower than 127 mm per 4 sec, plus:
2. no stinging flame over the fabric surface.
Found in: ASTM D 1230 / Dutch regulation of 8 Feb 2008.

This requirement is primarily practical. In fact, substances are now being declared safe based on m2 weight and composition:

• Smooth fabrics above 88 g/m2 are considered safe enough.
• All stoff en of acrylic, polyamide (nylon), polyester and/or wool are “safe. Note that nothing else should be mixed in.

There are separate requirements for nightwear, which can be found in the following standards:
1. For infants and children: EN 14878 (fire behavior of children’s nightwear).
2. For adults: Covenant Nightwear/ EN 1103

Any questions? Need more details? A great way to manually test if your clothing is satisfactory? Let me know.

Chris Koeleman – Q&A Quality Assistance!