Textile Fibers and Materials.

Textile Fibers:

“Textiles” is a broad term referring to any material that can be made into fabric by any method. Fibers are “hair-like” materials, either natural or manufactured, that form the basic element of fabric and other textiles.

A fiber is characterized by having a length at least 100 times its diameter.

The term refers to units that can be spun into a yarn or made into a fabric by various methods including weaving, knitting, braiding, felting, and spinning.

FIBER - morphological term for substances characterized by their flexibility, fineness and high ratio of length to cross sectional area.

It is defined as one of the delicate, hair portions of the tissues of a plant or animal or other substances that are very small in diameter in relation to their length.

Classification of Fibers:

Cotton:

● From “bolls” (seed pods) growing on bushes.

● Main textile products of China, India, Iran, Pakistan and Egypt.

● Made into a wide range of wearing apparel.

Advantages:

● Comfortable.

● Absorbent.

● Good color retention.

● Dyes & prints well.

● Washable.

● Strong.

● Drapes well.

● Easy to handle and sew.

● Inexpensive.

Disadvantages:

● Shrinks in hot water.

● Wrinkles easily.

● Weakened by perspiration and sun.

● Burns easily.

● Affected by mildew.

Flux:

● Flax is the fiber name; linen is the fabric name.

● World’s oldest textile fiber.

● Cellulosic fiber from stem of flax plant.

● Towels, sheets, and tablecloths are called “linens”.

Advantages:

● Strong.

● Comfortable.

● Hand-washable or dry-cleanable.

● Absorbent.

● Dyes and prints well.

● Resists dirt and stains.

● Durable.

● Withstands high heat.

● Lint-free.

Disadvantages:

● Wrinkles easily.

● Can be expensive.

● Shrinks.

● Burns easily.

● Affected by mildew.

● Difficult to remove creases.

● Shines if ironed.

Wool:

● Protein fiber from sheep or lambs but…

● Worsted (combed) wool is higher quality with long staple fibers (over 2 inches).

● Natural insulator.

● The term wool can only apply to all animal hair fibers, including the hair of cashmere or angora goat.

● As well as the specialty hair fibers of camel, alpaca, llama, or vicuna.

Advantages:

● Warm.

● Lightweight.

● Wrinkle-resistant.

● Absorbent.

● Dyes well.

● Comfortable.

● Durable.

● Easy to tailor.

● Recyclable.

Disadvantages:

● Affected by moths.

● Shrinks with heat and moisture.

● Needs special care, dry cleaning.

● Scratchy on skin.

● Weakens when wet.

● Harmed by bleach, perspiration.

Silk:

• Silkworms spin cocoons in filaments.

• Filament is a very long, fine, continuous thread.

• It can take as many as 500 cocoons to create 1 blouse.

Advantages:

• Soft.

• Drapes well.

• Dyes and prints well.

• Very strong.

• Lightweight.

• Resists soil, mildew, and moths.

• Comfortable.

• Absorbent.

Disadvantages:

• Expensive.

• Needs special care, dry cleaning.

• Stains with water.

• Yellows with age.

• Weakened by perspiration, sun, soap.

• Attacked by insects.

Coir:

• Is a natural fiber extracted from the husk (shell) of coconut.

• Products such as floor mats, doormats, brushes, mattresses, etc.

• Technically, coir is the fibrous material found between the hard, internal shell and the outer coat of a coconut.

• Other uses of brown coir are in upholstery padding and horticulture.

• White coir, harvested from unripe coconuts, is used for making finer brushes, string, rope and fishing nets.

Sisal fibers:

• Sisal is a perennial hardy plant, which unlike the other fibers is not a seasonal crop.

• It can establish and easily grow in all states of India covering sub humid to arid and semiarid regions, which cover major parts of India.

• Ropes, lines.

Pineapple(PINA)Fiber:

• Piña is a fiber made from the leaves of a pineapple and is commonly used in the Philippines

• It is sometimes combined with silk or polyester to create a textile fabric.

• The people there used to extract fibers from pineapple leaves and through hand spinning, made a soft, sheer and a little stiff fabric- the piña fabric.