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Compression creep behaviour of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics
Sanjoy Debnath a *and M.Madhusoothanan b
a
National Institute of Research on Jute &Allied Fibre Technology,Indian Council of Agricultural Research,Kolkata 700040,
India;b Department of Textile Technology,Anna University,Chennai,India
(Received 7November 2011;?nal version received 26March 2012)
This present study deals with the compression creep behaviour of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.Polyester ?bres of three different cross-sectional shapes (round,circular hollow and trilobal)have been selected for this study.An instrument has been designed and fabricated to measure the compression creep property of nee-dle-punched fabrics.The effect of duration of compression load,fabric weight,?bre cross-sectional shapes and reinforcing material on percentage compression creep has been studied.It has been observed that initially,com-pression creep decreases rapidly and with increase in time,decrease of percentage creep becomes minimal.After about 8500min of application of the same compression load,no change in compression creep is noticed.The per-centage compression creep decreases with the increase in fabric weight irrespective to ?bre cross-sectional shapes of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.Trilobal cross-sectional fabric shows maximum amount of percent-age compression creep at all levels of fabric weight followed by round and hollow cross-sectional polyester sam-ples,respectively.The percentage compression creep is higher in case of fabric samples made without reinforcing material compared to the samples with reinforcing material.Hollow cross-sectional polyester ?bre can be success-fully used as raw material for the preparation of needle-punched nonwoven fabrics with or without reinforcing material carpet or ?oor mats.However,normal round cross-sectional polyester ?bre only with reinforcing material can be used for the said https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,pression creep values of these selected polyester needle-punched fabric samples are much less in comparison with commercially available polypropylene needle-punched carpet samples.Keywords:compression creep;?bre cross-sectional shapes;needle-punched nonwoven;polyester ?bre;reinforcing material
Introduction
Among different synthetic ?bres,polyester ?bre is widely used as major ?bre in various domestic and industrial applications due to its good physical and fairly good chemical resistance properties.Other rea-son of its popularity is its easy availability in different ?bre cross-sectional shapes.This present study gives an account of visco-elastic compression nature of the polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.The visco-elastic nature of the fabrics is investigated by making measurements of compression creep.If a ?xed load is applied to a fabric,initially,the deformation changes rapidly and later on,the change is exponen-tial.This phenomenon is called creep.The time dependent deformation and relaxation processes are of great practical importance,because during service many materials undergo deformation and their durabil-ity depends on the creep behaviour.Cusick,Hearle,Michie,Peters,and Stevension (1963)measured the tensile stress relaxation,elastic recovery and other mechanical properties on a wide range of commer-cially available parallel-laid webs,cross-laid webs,random-laid webs,composite and perforated nonwo-ven fabrics.It has been reported in the literature that the surface mechanical properties of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics made from H1technology is highly in ?uenced by needle-punching rate and depth of needle penetration (Ramkumar &Roedel,2003).Shishoo (1972)measured tensile creep in the presence of steam on wool ?bres and yarns.It was found that pre-steaming markedly in ?uenced the sub-sequent extension and creep in steam,and maximum deformation was obtained at a pre-steaming time of 30s.Fox and Schwarz (1941)present a brief outline of previous developments in compression testing of textiles.They also gave the details of construction of an instrument intended for the study of compression creep and creep recovery and compression resilience of yarns and fabrics.Preliminary results are presented to show the characteristics of the instrument.Patel and Kothari (2001a,2001b)developed a model to predict the tensile creep behaviour of nonwoven fabrics using
*Corresponding author.Email:sanjoydebnath@https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,
The Journal of The Textile Institute
V ol.103,No.12,December 2012,1328–
1334
ISSN 0040-5000print/ISSN 1754-2340online Copyright ó2012The Textile Institute
https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,/10.1080/00405000.2012.680696https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,
the ?bre creep data and the structural parameters of the fabrics.A network structure of the constituent ?bres of nonwoven fabric was considered and creep strain was estimated.The changes in the structural parameters due to creep strain have been incorporated in the model.The model was used to obtain theoreti-cal creep curves for different nonwoven fabrics and these curves were compared with experimental creep https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,pression properties of needle-punched nonwoven fabrics have been studied extensively (Deb-nath &Madhusoothanan,2007,2009a,2009b,2010,2011,2012;Kothari &Das,1994)and also been pre-dicted by arti ?cial neural network models (Debnath,2011;Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2008).Research also reveals on the compression properties and param-eters in ?uencing such properties under wet conditions (Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2011,2012).However,compression creep being an important property,dearth of published research work in the line of needle-punched nonwoven fabric is available in the literature.This present paper emphasis on the effect of time,fab-ric weight,?bre cross-sectional shapes and reinforcing material on percentage creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.
Experimental Materials
Polyester ?bre of 51mm length and .33tex ?neness was used to prepare needle-punched samples due easy availability in the market.Cotton fabric was used as reinforcing material to improve the dimensional stabil-ity of needle-punched nonwoven fabrics (Hearle &Sultan,1968b).The properties of the polyester ?bre and reinforcing cotton fabric are shown in Tables 1and 2,respectively.Two commercial polypropylene needle-punched nonwoven fabrics (812and 1140g/m 2)containing jute hessian fabric as reinforcement fabric procured from local market have been used to compare the compression creep values with the devel-oped polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.Preparation of polyester nonwoven fabrics
The polyester fabric samples were made from parallel-laid webs,which were obtained by feeding opened
?bres in the TAIRO laboratory model with stationary ?at card.The ?ne web emerging out from the card was built up into several parallel-laid layers wounded up on a suitable rotating cylindrical drum surface in order to obtain desired level of fabric weight.After completion of required fabric weight,the parallel-laid ?bre web was removed from the drum surface by cutting the web parallel to the drum axis.In case of reinforced non-woven fabrics,the reinforcing material was cut as per the length and width of the web and placed between equal amounts of ?bre web layers before fed into needle punching machine.The needle punching of all parallel-laid polyester fabric samples was carried out in James Hunter Laboratory Fibre Locker [model 26(315mm)]having a stroke fre-quency of 170strokes/min.The machine speed and needling density were selected in such a way that in a single passage,50punches/cm 2of needling density could be obtained on the fabric (Debnath &Mad-husoothanan,2011,2012).The web was passed through the machine for a number of times depending upon the needling density required,for example,the web was passed six times through the machine to obtain fabric with 300punches/cm 2.The needling was done alternatively on each side of the polyester fabric (Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2007,2010).Construc-tional details of experimental fabric samples are shown in Table 3.The dimension of the needle was taken as 15?18?36?R /SP 3??1=4?9,as is used generally for all jute-polypropylene,jute and polyester samples.The depth of needle penetration was kept constant at 11mm in all the cases (Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2009a,2009b).The actual fabric
Table 1.Properties of polyester ?bre.Fibre cross-sectional shape Fibre staple length
(mm)
Linear density
(tex)
Crimp frequency (crimps/cm)
Tenacity (cN/
tex)
Breaking extension
(%)
Crimp (%)Round 51.33 5.0434.8351.0018.00Circular hollow 51.33 4.7238.4321.0517.00Trilobal
51
.33
5.12
37.53
50.28
18.00
Table 2.Properties of cotton reinforcing material.Property
Value Yarn linear density (tex)Warp 14.77(40.00s Ne)Weft
17.96(32.88s Ne)
Yarn density Ends/cm 23.62Picks/cm
18.90Fabric weight (g/m 2)76.25Breaking extension (%)17.25Tenacity at break (cN/tex)
6.23
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weights of the ?nal needle-punched fabric samples were measured by randomly cutting 1m 2specimen at ?ve different places from each sample.
Methods
Measurement of compression creep
An instrument has been developed,as shown in the line diagram in Figure 1,to measure the compression creep of the needle-punched nonwoven fabrics (Fox &Schwarz,1941).The instrument is capable enough to measure the compression creep for four samples at a time.The fabric samples were mounted under a known compression load with a dial gauge (D)to measure the thickness under the compression.The pressure foot (C)diameter was chosen as 25.4mm (1inch)for all samples.The least count of the dial gauge (D)was .01mm.The nonwoven sample was placed between the pressure foot (C)and anvil (I).The initial thickness was noted without adding any additional load.The instant deformation (T 0)was noted from dial gauge after applying the compression load (H)of 25.51N (2.6kg)at the top of the weight pan (J)of dial gauge (D).The selection of this pres-sure foot diameter of 25.4mm and compression load
Table 3.Constructional details of experimental fabric samples.Fabric code
Fibre cross-sectional shape Nominal fabric weight (g/m 2)Needling density (punches/cm 2)Presence of reinforcing material
R1Round 415300Yes R2Round 515300Yes R3Round 680300Yes R4Round 815300Yes R5Round 415300No H1Circular hollow 415300Yes H2Circular hollow 515300Yes H3Circular hollow 680300Yes H4Circular hollow 815300Yes H5Circular hollow 415300No T1Trilobal 415300Yes T2Trilobal 515300Yes T3Trilobal 680300Yes T4Trilobal 815300Yes T5
Trilobal
415
300
No
Figure 1.Line sketch of the developed instrument for measuring compression creep of needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.
1330S.Debnath and M.Madhusoothanan
of2.6kg is to simulate the area of the foot of a nor-mal chair and weight of a normal empty chair comes on the carpet surface through each leg of chair, respectively(Debnath&Madhusoothanan,2007, 2008,2009a,2009b,2011,in press;Kothari&Das, 1994).To study the compression creep,each sample was allowed to remain under this compression load for168h(7days).This compression creep time was selected because it was found from previous study that all the fabrics compression creep reaches equilibrium within168h(Debnath,2004,Debnath&Madhusoo-thanan,in press).The percentage compression creep was calculated from the thickness deformation values, which was measured using the following equation (Debnath,2004,Debnath&Madhusoothanan,in press):
Compression creep(%)?T0àT t
T0
?100;(1)
where T0is the instant thickness after applying the
maximum load and T t is the thickness after seven
days.
The average of10readings from different places for each sample was considered.The coef?cient of
variation was<6%in all the cases.
The measurement of fabric thickness and compres-
sion creep properties was carried out in the standard
atmospheric condition maintained at65±2%RH and
20°±2°C,as?bre properties changes with varying
temperature and relative humidity(Booth,1976).The
fabrics were conditioned for72h in the above mentioned atmospheric conditions before testing. Results and discussion
Effect of time and fabric weight on percentage
compression creep
Figure2shows the general nature of compression
creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.
It is found from this?gure that initially,compression
creep decreases rapidly and with increase in time,very
little decrease in creep has been observed.After about 8500min of installed compression load,no change in
compression creep was noticed.Rapid change in com-
pression creep at initial stage is due to high amount of ?bre-to-?bre slippage in the vertical pegs(Hearle& Purdy,1974)of fabric structure.With the progress in
time,the amount of?bre-to-?bre slippage reduces and ?bre creep occurs,which results in further?attening of vertical pegs in the fabric structure causing slow change in percentage creep.After about8500min of compression load,both?bre-to-?bre slippage and?bre creep are negligible,and hence,insigni?cant change of compression creep was observed.This similar trend of compression creep has been found in all the samples irrespective to?bre cross-sectional shapes, fabric weight and presence of reinforcing material. However,the maximum compression creep of each sample varies with?bre cross-sectional shapes,fabric weight and presence of reinforcing material which are been studied https://www.360docs.net/doc/005500374.html,mercial polypropylene fabric samples also follow similar trend as observed in case of developed polyester needle-punched fabric samples.
Effect of fabric weight on percentage compression creep
It is found from this Figure3that with the increase in fabric weight from415to815g/m2,the percentage compression creep decreases signi?cantly irrespective to?bre cross-sectional shapes.With the increase in fabric weight,the amount of?bres per unit area of the fabric increases(Hearle&Sultan,1968a).During
the
The Journal of The Textile Institute1331
process of needling,more amounts of ?bres are presented to the needle barbs causing in better entanglement of ?bres.This forms compactness of the vertical pegs (Hearle &Purdy,1974),as a result the same compression load is shared among more num-bers of ?bres (Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2009b,2012;Midha,Alagirusamy,&Kothari,2004;Ramku-mar &Roedel,2003).Hence,decrease in percentage compression creep occurs with the increase in fabric weight from 415to 815g/m 2(Figure 3).It is observed from Table 4that the compression creep values of the commercial polypropylene needle-punched fabric sam-ples are very closer to that of polyester needle-punched fabric at heavier fabric weight (815g/m 2).Effect of ?bre cross-sectional shape on percentage compression creep
Figure 3also shows the effect of ?bre cross-sectional shapes on compression creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.Trilobal cross-sectional shape polyester fabric shows highest percentage of compression creep followed by round and hollow cross-sectional polyester fabric samples.This is due to presence of lobes on the ?bre surface.Trilobal cross-sectional polyester fabric cannot easily entangle for the same needling density (300punches/cm 2)used for all other fabrics (Debnath &Madhusoothanan,2009b).Hence,less consolidated structure results in more void in the fabric.During prolonged compres-sion load,these voids get ?attened which causes high amount of percentage compression creep at all levels of fabric weight compared to other ?bre cross-sec-tional shapes samples.However,due to hollow struc-ture,hollow cross-sectional polyester sample easily consolidates during needling (Midha et al.,2004)and show least compression creep compared to other cross-sectional fabric samples.However,at higher fab-ric weight due to more amount of ?bre entanglement the creep reduces irrespective to ?bre cross-sectional samples.At lower fabric weight,the ?bre loops and pegs slip among them to a larger extent to compensate
the external load.This shows higher percentage of creep for trilobal fabric under lower fabric weight (415g/m 2).At higher fabric weight,compression creep of the developed polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics with solid round and hollow cross-sectional shapes are lower than commercial polypro-pylene needle-punched fabrics (Table 4).
Effect of reinforcing material on percentage compression creep
Figure 4presents the effect of reinforcing material on percentage compression creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabric samples.It has been found from Figure 4that,the percentage compression creep is higher in case of samples made without reinforcing material compared to the samples with reinforcing material irrespective to ?bre cross-sectional shapes.This is due to the fact that,the presence of reinforcing material provides better entanglement among the ?bre which results in better consolidated structure.When the compression load is applied for a long time,then maximum ?bre-to-?bre slippage occurs in the fabric made without reinforcing material because ?bres are not better entangled compared to the samples with reinforcing material.In the case of hollow cross-sectional sample,the ?bres in the fabric web can be consolidated easily during the process of needling and hence,the effect of reinforcing material on compres-sion creep is marginal (Figure 4).However,the lobs present on the surface of trilobal cross-sectional poly-ester sample makes it dif ?cult to attain compact struc-ture even with the presence of reinforcing material because of its bulkiness.During the compression creep,the lobs on ?bre surface of trilobal polyester ?bres slips easily and this reduces the thickness con-siderably.In case of round cross-sectional sample,under prolonged compression load,the ?bre slippage is comparatively higher than the hollow cross-
Table 4.Some properties of two commercial needle-punched carpet fabric samples.Fabric properties
Red sample Blue sample Fabric weight (g/m 2)
8121140Fabric thickness (mm)at 2kPa 3.68 3.30Coef ?cient of variation of thickness (%) 3.277.88Compression creep (%)13.1312.75Coef ?cient of variation of compression creep (%)
7.97
7.55
Figure 4.Effect of reinforcing material on percentage compression creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.
1332S.Debnath and M.Madhusoothanan
sectional samples even in the presence of reinforcing material.In the absence of reinforcing material,fabric made up with round cross-sectional?bres consolidate to maximum extent due to smooth surfaces on the cross-section.This results in higher compression creep of round cross-sectional polyester fabric in the absence of reinforcing material.In round cross-sectional shaped?bre,the surface area is minimum compared to other cross-sectional shaped?bres.Hence,the com-pactness achieved during needling reduces the percent-age compression creep in the presence of reinforcing material in case of round cross-sectional shape?bers compared to trilobal cross-sectional shape?bres.The effect of reinforcing material on percentage compres-sion creep of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fab-rics at415g/m2fabric weight can be applied to the other three heavier samples also(Debnath&Mad-husoothanan,2009b,2012;Hearle&Sultan,1968b). Compression creep of round and hollow cross-sectional shape polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics is lesser than commercial polypropylene needle-punched carpet fabrics.
Conclusions
Following conclusions can be drawn from the present study on the compression creep behaviour of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics with varying fabric weight,?bre cross-sectional shapes and reinforcing material.
Initially,compression creep decreases rapidly and with increase in time,very little decrease of percent-age creep has been observed.Beyond around 8500min of application of the same compression load, no change in compression creep has been noticed.
The percentage compression creep decreases with the increase in fabric weight irrespective to?bre cross-sectional shapes of polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics.
The maximum amount of percentage compression creep was observed in the case of trilobal cross-sec-tional fabric at all levels of fabric weight followed by round and hollow cross-sectional polyester samples, respectively.
The percentage compression creep is higher in case of fabric samples made without reinforcing mate-rial compared to the samples with reinforcing material. The maximum compression creep was observed in case of round cross-sectional samples followed by tril-obal and hollow cross-sectional polyester needled fab-rics,respectively.
Based on the aforesaid conclusions,hollow cross-sectional polyester?bre can be successfully used as raw material for preparation of needle-punched non-woven fabrics with or without reinforcing material carpet or?oor mats.However,normal round cross-sectional polyester?bre only with reinforcing mate-rial can be used for the said application.These selected polyester needle-punched nonwoven fabrics are superior than commercial polypropylene carpet available in market as per compression creep is con-cerned.
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