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During the course of a fire and subsequent exposure to the environment, iron and low-carbon steels oxidize by two mechanisms: high temperature oxidation and atmospheric corrosion. Of particular interest to fire investigators are oxide properties and distribution that could be of use to better understand important characteristics of the fire such as the location the fire originated, the direction the fire traveled or even temperature versus time characteristics. This could be particularly valuable in cases where burn damage to combustible material, which is known to be an important indicator of fire origin, is so extensive that little if any material remains after the fire. However, there is little data in the literature that specifically addresses the utility of oxide properties in the context of fire investigations.

This paper summarizes hot surface ignition data for automotive fluids in the literature, as well as the ignition data for vegetation, paper and cotton, and compares it to measured motor vehicle exhaust system temperatures. While hot surface ignition is a complex phenomena and the temperatures attained by motor vehicle exhaust systems depend on many factors, these comparisons can be useful in evaluating motor vehicle fire causation scenarios. Comparing hot surface ignition data in the literature is complicated by limitations in the statistical analysis used to address the underlying probabilistic nature of the ignition data. Because the statistical uncertainty of measured ignition probability can be significant, this paper reviews the three methods that have been used to address this probabilistic nature in the literature and illustrates statistical techniques that can be used to make statistically significant comparisons between different sets of ignition data.