What do you know about textile fibers?

What are different types of fibers in textiles?

Knowing the type of fiber you will use is not only important for product development and creating the best product possible, but also for your import and export duties. Some textile fibers, like cotton, actually receive lower import taxes than a synthetic fiber like polyester. If you know the rules, and how to optimize fiber blends, you can create a premium product and save your company some serious cash.

Natural and manufactured

There are two main classifications of textile fibers, they are natural and manufactured, or synthetic. They are exactly what they sound like. Natural textile fibers derive in nature, like from plants and animals. Synthetic textile fibers which require manufacturing in a laboratory. Synthetic fibers help fill in the gaps or solve specific needs that natural fibers can not. In other words, their design is for specific performance. There is no such thing as a perfect fiber. Every fiber has its pros and cons. The art of textile science is to blend fibers, yarns, and weaving or knitting techniques to create the fabric that is perfect for what you are specifically designing.

What are different types of Natural fibers?

Plants and Animals

Natural fibers are split into two main groups - plants and animals. Plants are cellulosic based (made of cellulose), like cotton and hemp. And, animal fibers are protein based, like wool. Knowing this will help a lot when we start to talk about different dye types later on in another mini-course.

Types of Plant Fibers

What are types of plant fibers? The plant fiber group is then broken into 3 subgroups. These are fibers that come from the stem of the plant like flax, hemp and jute, fibers that come from the leaves of plants like sisal and abaca, and lastly, fibers that come from the seed portion of the plant like cotton and kapok (kapok is cotton's wild cousin).
Animals fibers just come from animals, some examples include yak, alpaca, sheep's wool, and vicuna.

What about silk?

Silk comes from the cocoon of the silkworm. We consider it to be an animal-based fiber. Traditionally the cocoons were thrown into chemicals or boiling water to unravel the silk filament, killing the worm in the process. Today, many people find this practice cruel, so there is peace silk. This type of silk allows the worm to hatch from the cocoon, and then the fibers are gathered. The problem with this is that the silk yarn is not 1 long continuous fiber, so peace silk is not as smooth and consistent as traditional silk manufacturing methods.