Non-woven fabric with flame retardant properties and method of making same

A method of manufacturing a non-woven fabric comprising

• 75 to 95% by weight polypropylene based fibers, said polypropylene based fibers comprising about 80 to 99% by weight polypropylene and 1 to 20% by weight of a heat stabilizer, and
• 5 to 25% by weight polyester based fibers, said polyester based fibers comprising 80 to 100% by weight polyester and 0 to 20% by weight of a flame retardant,
• said fabric being manufactured by:
• admixing staple polypropylene based fibers and staple polyester fibers in an amount of 75 to 95% by weight polypropylene based fibers and 5 to 25% by weight polyester based fibers,
• carding the admixed fibers by a textile card to form a mat aligned in a processing direction,
• processing the mat in the processing direction through a main loom with a needle penetration of between about 3 and 12 mm,
• hot calendaring the processed mat at a temperature of about 250 to 400° F. and a pressure of between about 700 and 1200 psi on one first side only.

A needle punch non-woven flame retardant fabric comprising,

• 80 to 92% by weight six denier polypropylene based fibers, said polypropylene based fibers comprising about 80 to 99% by weight polypropylene and 0 to 20% by weight of a heat stabilizer;
• 8 to 20% by weight five denier polyester based fibers, said polyester based fibers comprising about 90 to 98% by weight polyester and 2 to 10% by weight of a phosphorous based flame retardant;
• said fabric further characterized by
• said polypropylene based fibers and said polyester based fibers being contact heat fused to each other on one first side of said fabric only, and wherein the second other side of said fabric being characterized by said polypropylene based fibers and said polyester based fibers being only partially fused to each other.