I am working on the plasma treatment of merino wool for shrink proofing application. The changes in surface morphology (descaling) is one method to check shrink proofing of wool. I need to know, are there any other standard tests/practices in textile industry, which can be performed on fiber to determine shrink proofing?
Testing shrink proofing performance of wool at the fibre stage is possible by application of different methods. The most established test procedure is TM 31 (Woolmark) based on knitted fabrics produced from shrinkproofed tops. For this you need larger amounts of material enabling yarn spinning and knitting as well as a special washing machine for application of the test.
Sorry, I've send my previous answer too fast. In addition to the TM 31 you can apply a test on wool tops according to the Aachen felting test (IWTO 20-69). In this case 1 g of wool is formed to a ball that is exposed to a mechanical agitation in a buffer solution. At 1 hour the size of the dried felted ball is measured in all directions. From this the felting density can be calculated which can be used as a measure for description of the felting tendency.
Thanks a lot Dr.Helga, your answer would definitely be helpful to me.
In case you need some further informations on the test procedures, please, let me know. I will then try to organise the test specifications for you.
And the other specification I've previously mentioned.
Best regards.
helga Thomas
Dear Helga,
I was reading your comments. At this stage, i would like to find a relation between the values of -felting density ( IWTO20) and superwash (TM31), is it possibly to find this information somewhere?
Dear Sandra,
There is no information available. We tried to find a correlatrion between the 2 tests. However, we couldn't see significant correlation, only very coarse trends. For my opinion the main reason for this is that two different testing procedures with extremely different fibre making up are compared. In case of TM 31 you are washing a knitwear produced from a yarn on basis of a set cover factor as well as set parameters for yarn make up. The test result strongly depends on these parameters. E.g. in case you are going to test a higher twisted yarn, the resulting shrinkage behaviour is decreased, in case of less dense yarns the skrinkage behaviour is increased. In contrast to TM 31 in the IWTO-test only wool tops are tested (without any individual fibre fixation by yarn and knitwear construction). I believe that this is the main reason for the lack in correlation between both methods.
do you know the difference between EASY CARE and Superwash standard? is it the same?
Yes, you can measure the felting propensity of wool fiber, which will give an indication about its shrink proofing performance. Mainly two methods, DFE method and Aachen felt ball method, are available for measuring the felting propensity of wool. Of them, Aachen felt ball method is easier than the other method.
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