Objective Hand Measurement of Nonwoven Fabrics

Abstract

Fabric hand evaluation, previously applied to men's suiting, is used here to assess the touch or feel of nonwoven fabrics. In this method, fabric mechanical property parameters are converted by a first conversion equation (equation type I ) to numbers (the hand value or Hv) that express three primary hand values (the Hv) such as stiffness, etc., which are the primary factors characterizing fabric hand. Subsequently, these hand values are converted into a total fabric quality number (the total hand value or THV) by a second conversion equation (equation type II), which should then correlate well with subjective hand. The three primary hand attributes defined pre viously for men's suiting are also assumed to apply to nonwoven fabrics to characterize their hand. Primary hand values for nonwovens were obtained using the same equation as the men's suiting equation with minor modifications. Subsequently, two evaluations were performed—direct application of the men's suiting equation (type II ) to the nonwoven fabrics to derive their THV and construction of a new type II equation for the THV of nonwoven fabrics. Both equations can be used to predict nonwoven THV, but the predictive ability of the new equation is better than that of the previous one, and its prediction error is smaller than that of the subjective judgments made by average individuals. The correlations between THV and mechanical parameters were also examined; MMD, a frictional property parameter, was the most important param eter affecting THV.