Fire Detection Using Quartz Crystal Microbalance Chemical Sensors

Abstract

The new application of piezoelectric quartz-crystal microbalance (QCM) sensors to fire detection is described. The QCM sensors are coated with plasma organic films which are sensitive to vapors emitted from burning polyvinyl chloride (PVC) cables and epoxy resin circuit boards. These vapors must be distinguished because these sensors also respond to humidity. Principal component analysis reveals that this system can discriminate between vapors emitted from burning materials and humidity. Vapor discrimination is also described using the Kohonen's Learning Vector Quantization (LVQ).