Spark arrestor
Catcher of flammable debris
A spark arrester (sometimes spark arrestor) is any device which prevents the emission of flammable debris from combustion sources, such as internal combustion engines, fireplaces, and wood-burning stoves.
Spark arresters play a critical role in the prevention of wildland fire and ignition of explosive atmospheres. Consequently, their use is required by law in many jurisdictions worldwide.
Applications
Engines
Steam
Spark arresters for steam locomotives may be internal (in the form of wire mesh inside the smokebox) or external. The earliest platforms for spark arresters in the United States were steam locomotives. Wood- and coal-burning locomotives produce embers which are readily transported by the wind. One popular design was the Radley–Hunter spark arrester, which used a spiral-shaped cone to separate embers from the exhaust flow by centrifugal force.
The problem of equipment-started fires continued into the 20th century. University of California, Berkeley researchers J.P. Fairbank and Roy Bainer provided the first known academic research on the subject in 1934. Their experiments demonstrated that hot particulate matter larger than 0.023 inches (0.584 mm) in diameter was capable of igniting wildland fuels.
“Spark arrestor” enters the record as catcher of flammable debris. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Spark, arrestor and Catcher can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1253401. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1934.
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This entry incorporates text from “Spark arrestor” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.