For many years, silk fabrics have been well received by consumers, but due to its high cost, easy to wrinkle, easy to fade, easy to age and yellow, and difficult to care, the silk fabrics have gradually attracted people's attention.

What is the silk fabric?

The so-called silk is essentially a physical or chemical modification of the polyester fiber to make it similar to silk in appearance and wearing properties.

The products that use polyester as the raw material of the silk, whether it is the appearance or the hand, have basically reached the level of realism. Polyester artificial silk products combine the advantages of natural and synthetic fibers, with silk style, light and elegant, soft and smooth, soft gloss, good drape, comfortable and strong, wear-resistant, non-scalding, anti-wrinkle, washable performance ratio Silk fabric is good.

Since the 1960s, with the rapid development of synthetic fibers, the research and development of synthetic fiber silk has emerged. Throughout the development of polyester-simulated silk, it has experienced five important stages of development:

First generation

(1962~1968)

Committed to the appearance of silk. It is made of profiled wire, ordinary polyester yarn, strong twist and false twist processing technology and alkali reduction treatment. The product has body and luster, a smooth feel and good non-scalding and anti-caries properties.

Second generation

(1969~1973)

Committed to the pursuit of silk style. The development of cationic dyeable polyester is the main symbol of the second generation. It brings polyester silk products closer to silk products in terms of fiber structure and style, and has developed antistatic and antifouling products.

Third Generation

(1973~1978)

Committed to a deeper level of imitation silk appearance and aesthetics. It has developed high-multifilament, super multifilament and entangled silk products centering on physical modification. Fine denier and blended fiber technology are the main symbols of the third generation. At the same time, the development of polygonal shaped cross-section filaments improves color development, color depth and vividness in dyeing and finishing techniques. Therefore, the fabric has a silky luster, and the hand feels soft and fluffy, making it difficult to pilling.

Fourth Generation

(1979~1984)

Committed to the essence of silk. During this period, we have developed the ultra-fine denier, profiled and mixed fiber technology of polyester filaments and applied a variety of techniques to make the polyester filaments have silky silky and lustrous, as well as good hygroscopicity and antifouling properties.

Fifth Generation

(since 1985)

Committed to the development of "super silk products". In addition to continuing to maintain the silky style, the new generation of polyester simulation silk also focuses on “super”, which is characterized in a certain way, which not only combines the silk style, but also has its own characteristics.

After more than 50 years of history, the silk products have been simulated by simple molds, such as silk luster and organizational structure, and have been close to the simulation of silk comfort performance. Some have even reached the situation of “extra and super”. In addition to being able to achieve strengths and avoid weaknesses, some can also add more new functions in line with human consumption requirements, such as antibacterial, sunscreen, ceramic health care, etc. according to the strong plasticity of chemical fibers.

Silk fabric

Manufacturing Technology

Ordinary polyester filament silk technology

Mainly combined with weaving, through 15% ~ 35% alkali reduction processing to improve the fiber feel and improve the degree of simulation. Polyester fiber is hydrolyzed under the action of hot alkali, so that the surface of the fiber is ablated and the crack is cracked, the structure is slack, the fiber is thinner, the weight is reduced, the interlacing resistance of the fabric is reduced, and the rigidity is reduced to obtain a natural silky soft hand. Soft gloss and good drape.

After the polyester fiber is treated by alkali reduction, the surface of the fiber loses its original smoothness, and there are excavation marks. As the reduction rate increases, the width of the spot also increases, even at some weak points inside the fiber. Local cracking has occurred, see the figure above. And when the alkali reduction rate reaches 15%~20%, the obvious silk effect is obtained.

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Change fiber cross section

The cross section of ordinary polyester filament is round, and the fabric is relatively smooth, has a waxy feel, and is easy to produce aurora, and the fabric weaved has a great difference from the silk fabric.

The cross section of the silk is similar to a triangle, so that in the contact with the light, the role of the triangular prism can be exerted, that is, a part of the light is reflected while partially reflecting the light, and has a strong internal reflected light and a low surface reflected light. Make silk fabrics have a unique, soft luster.

Nowadays, the fiber section has developed from a triangle to a polygon, a Y-shape, an H-shape and a star. It can be said that the change is endless and the hollow section has been published. These shaped wires can eliminate aurora, soften the gloss and improve the hand feeling; at the same time, improve the moisture permeability, air permeability, stain resistance and the like of the fabric. These properties enable the silk product not only to be close to the silk product in appearance, but also to achieve "god" in terms of gloss and fluffiness.

Fine denier technology

The excellent drape, pearly luster and soft hand of silk fabrics are largely derived from the finer denier. Therefore, in the study of polyester silk, fine denier is an important direction.

The use of fine fibrillated filament raw material production increases the layered structure of the filament in the product, thereby realizing the ability of the fiber to reflect light inside, so that the fiber fabric exhibits a more delicate luster, further mimicking the luster characteristics of the silk product.

In addition, thanks to the high degree of fine fiberization of the raw materials, the fineness of the single fiber in such silk products is small, and the hand feeling of the fabric can be further improved. This technology has also been widely used in actual production.

E.g

Qiao Qichen is a combination of fine denier and strong sputum technology, combined with the subsequent alkali reduction process, and finally made into a silk crepe. The silk products produced through this process are soft, drape, and other raw materials. Compared with the silk products produced, it shows better taking performance. The application of ultra-fine denier in the field of artificial silk products has greatly improved the proportion of such products in the field of clothing.

Strong twist, false twist, uneven thickness drafting and surface modification technology

Through the processing techniques such as strong twisting and false twisting, the dispersibility, smoothness and roughness of polyester monofilament can be improved, and the puffing rate, crimping rate and shrinkage rate of the warp and weft yarn can be controlled consciously, thereby obtaining fluffy, soft, elastic and 绉 effect. Such as the appearance of the effect. Through the uneven drafting of the thickness, the unevenness of the thickness in the longitudinal direction of the monofilament makes the appearance style closer to the natural silk, and the same distribution effect of the thickness of the fabric is obtained. In addition, a more detailed simulation of the prominent microscopic microstructure features surface modification, on the one hand to obtain natural unevenness, on the other hand, the micro-cracks on the surface after treatment, so that the surface of the fiber has a groove close to the wavelength of the light wave, which can be deeper. The color and the good sense of silk.

Composite wire

The composition of ordinary polyester filaments is unitary, and the composite filaments are composed of two or more non-mixed polymers. Manufacturers can choose according to different needs when selecting raw materials.

Core-core composite wire

The composite yarn is composed of two polymers of different compositions, one component is distributed in the center of the fiber to form a core, and the other component is distributed in the skin layer of the fiber to form a sheath-core structure, usually made of polyester core and nylon Cortex. Since nylon is in the skin layer, it has good hygroscopicity and dyeability, and at the same time, since the polyester having a higher modulus of elasticity has a supporting structure in the core layer, the woven fabric has better wrinkle resistance. If you want to weave a silk fabric that is easy to dye and feel good, you can give priority to the core-sheath composite yarn.

Microporous composite wire

Since polyester is a hydrophobic fiber, in the manufacturing process of the artificial silk, the fabric has disadvantages such as poor gas permeability, no sweat absorption and poor wearing comfort. In order to solve this problem, a microporous composite yarn has been developed, which adopts a physical method of blending hollow and supplemented with a chemical treatment method of alkali reduction to obtain a microporous structure, so that there are voids inside the fiber, and the inner and outer layers are penetrated. The microporous structure enhances the water absorption and moisture absorption of the fiber. Therefore, in the production of high water absorption and moisture absorption silk fabrics, many product developers will give priority to the use of microporous composite yarns to achieve this function.

Written in the final future, the raw materials of silk will develop in a diversified direction, and at the same time, it will be more closely matched with the subsequent dyeing and finishing process to achieve more excellent silk effect. The cost of simulating silk fabrics is low, and the market has a large development space.