February 4, 2021
The European Committee for Standardization (CEN) has recently published EN 71-2:2020, the standard for Flammability Toy Safety. This European Standard shall be given the status of a national standard, either by the publication of an identical text or by endorsement, at the latest by June 2021. Conflicting national standards shall be withdrawn at the latest by December 2021.
This document supersedes EN 71-2:2011+A1:2014.
The focus of the revisions and additions are largely related to toy disguise costumes. A toy disguise costume is defined as “a costume intended to be worn by children to facilitate imaginative play where the child pretends to be a character.” New testing requirements for toy disguise costumes are summarized below:
- Clause 4.3 New requirements for toy disguise costumes containing loose stuffing that would fall out during testing to clause 5.4.1.2:
- 5.4.1.2 Fully revised to increase testing of smaller specimens by allowing combined specimens or half-sized specimens and narrow materials as well as specifying testing of fillings, trims and embellishments.
- Clause 5.4.1.1 Added requirements for toy disguise costumes to be tested before and after washing even if instructions state not to wash.
- Clause 5.4.2 Addition of wire mesh to test specimen holder to allow testing of narrow materials.
- Clause 5.5 Inclusion of soft-filled parts of disguise costumes if they contain loose filling that would otherwise fall out during testing under 5.4.1.2 (see reference above).
- Clause 5.5.3 Clarified that the measurement of maximum unhindered dimension refers to the part(s) that are soft filled regardless of whether the toy has a head or not. Clarified that timings are made to the top of the soft-filled parts and not to the top of the entire toy unless the top of the toy is also a soft-filled part.
In addition, two new annexes are also related to toy disguise costumes:
- A.8 Suggestions to manufacturers of toy disguise costumes on how to reduce rate of spread of flame.
- A.9 Flow diagrams to aid clarification on how to obtain test specimens from toy disguise costumes.
Please note: These referred technical changes include the significant technical changes from the EN revision but are not an exhaustive list of all modifications from the previous version.