Comfort properties of bamboo/cotton blended knitted fabrics produced from rotor spun yarns

Abstract

The comfort characteristics of bamboo/cotton-blended knitted fabrics made from rotor-spun yarns were studied in this research work. Five different blend proportions namely 100% bamboo, 100% cotton, 50:50 cotton:bamboo, 70:30 cotton:bamboo and 30:70 cotton:bamboo were used to produce rotor-spun yarns of 30^sNe_c. The yarn samples developed out of these different blend proportions were evaluated for yarn strength and elongation, yarn unevenness, yarn imperfections and used to produce single-jersey-knitted fabrics. All the fabric samples were dyed and finished. Fabric samples were evaluated for geometrical properties such as course/inch, wales/inch, stitch density and thickness apart from measuring comfort properties such as airpermeability, thermal conductivity, thermal resistance and water vapour permeability. The results indicated that 50/50 bamboo/cotton-blended knits have comparable fabric quality in terms of comfort properties with respect to 100% bamboo fabrics.

Keywords:

• bamboo fibres
• comfort
• thermal conductivity and resistance
• air permeability
• water vapour permeability

Acknowledgements

The authors express their sincere thanks to Management of Kumaraguru College of Technology, Coimbatore and Textile Research Centre, TIFAC-CORE in Textile Technology and Machinery, of Kumaraguru College of Technology, Coimbatore, India for permitting to process all the samples in their advanced manufacturing laboratory.