Ascalon from Alexium certified for FR performance

The testing was undertaken at four different testing facilities by Magill Services Inc. of Conway, South Carolina, USA, an ISO17025 approved textile and apparel testing laboratory, (Accreditation No. 67822) with over 20 years’ experience as a US Department of Defense, QLL certified testing facility (#18030). Magill Services also hold a USA/Canada Joint Certification (#0066762).

“The key test for FR performance, the vertical burn, is a notoriously variable test and the results can be highly dependent on the particular production setup used,” stated Dirk Van Hyning, Alexium’s Head of Product Development and Commercial Transfer.

“This reality, combined with Alexium’s constant drive to satisfy the performance and quality needs of our customers, led us to undertake the independent tests to provide benchmark performance for quality control for different set ups and for wider product applications.”

The results from the four different test facility set ups show a high 75% correlation and performance that exceeds product requirements with the remainder showing higher results, typical of the variability seen in the vertical burn test using different set ups.

Stated Van Hyning, “Although we were certainly pleased with the solid performance from Ascalon through independent testing, we also saw the data as an opportunity to take the quality of the product to a new level for the benefit of our current, as well as our potential, manufacturing partners.”

Using the data from the study and insight gained from the testing community, Alexium was able to make small changes to the technology which improved key FR performance measures by 44% and reduced variability in those measures by 58%. “Importantly, we are now able to provide confidence from independent tests for our future manufacturing partners, for important manufacturing mileposts such as percentage first quality and on-time delivery,” added Van Hyning.

Alexium