What Testing Instruments are the Most Commonly Used in Textile Laboratories?

It is well-known that a series of product tests are a must for those factories that produce fabric and garments, such as the textile factories, and garment factories. They do that for the purpose of smooth factory sales or reaching the customers’ requirements about quality. So what testing instruments are the most commonly used in the textile laboratories? You can make a reference according to the following list which mainly talks about the physical tests.

1. Textile Tensile Testing Machine

When textiles are subject to mechanical external forces such as tensile, compression, bending, and friction, they will suffer from fracture, tearing, bursting, or other kinds of damage inevitably. But you can determine the duration of the textiles based on these damages. So how to do that? Textile Tensile Testing Machine is an expert specialized in testing the duration of textiles driven by the external force according to the degree of tearing and rupturing. It can also be used for leather, plastic, paper, and so on.

Firstly, two ends of the material specimen are generally clamped on the two fixtures at a certain distance respectively. The fixtures will not stop separating and stretching the material specimen at a constant speed until the specimen is destroyed. And after that, you can record the change of stress and measure the peak force and yield strength of the products. This tensile tester is broadly classified into two categories, a hydraulic tensile testing machine, and an electronic tensile testing machine in the early days. However, hydraulic tensile testing machines occupy little market share nowadays due to their poor accuracy without meeting the required standard and lack of ability to test equipment with relatively high force values.

During the test process, the Textile Tensile Testing Machine needs to connect with a computer that is used for the collection and analysis of data based on which the testing result and report are made.
For more detailed information, welcome to visit the Testex website.

2. Martindale Abrasion & Pilling Tester

This instrument is designed for testing the abrasion and pilling of various textiles. In the beginning, the circular specimen is placed on the grinding head and make a contact with a standard woolen fabric abrasive fixed on the grinding table under the specified pressure. Then it will be subjected to multidirectional translational friction in accordance with the LISSAJOUS trajectory (synthesized by two mutually perpendicular resonant motions). The instrument will stop automatically if the circular specimen has been rubbed for specified times. Finally, we need to compare the standard parameter with the number of textiles that have abrasion and pilling after the experiment so as to get the related data. Martindale Abrasion & Pilling Tester is used to test the abrasion resistance and pilling performance of cotton, hemp, silk woven fabrics, and other textiles. In addition, it can also be applied to test the membrane materials, knitted fabrics, woolen textiles, artificial leather, synthetic leather, gloves, labor protection materials, and so on.

There are two tests that can be taken by this instrument:
1)Test for fabric pilling
The test can be applied to both knitted and woven fabrics. During this process, the textile samples and friction cloth will be rubbed against each other on a grinding platform, which will form some geometries. After that, we need to make a comparison between damaged samples and standard samples. The samples can be classified into five levels based on different degrees of pilling:

Level 5	no pilling
Level 4	slight pilling
Level 3	medium pilling
Level 2	a little severe pilling
Level 1	greatly severe pilling

2)Test for textile abrasion resistance
Fabric specimens are required to be fixed on the grinding platform and perform friction with the frictional cloth clinging to the grinding head. And we can obtain textile abrasion resistance from the degree of damage and the mass loss of the specimen as well as its change in appearance under the guidance of atomic absorption spectrometry.

The machine can normally be customized with 4, 6, or 9 stations to meet with various needs of customers. It also allows each station to do the test simultaneously to improve the efficiency of testing. The instrument is equipped with different weights and fixtures, and its grinding head can be adapted to various European and American standards.

3. Moisture Management Tester

The Moisture Management Tester, also named rapid Moisture Management Tester, measures the performance of dynamic liquids, such as transport properties, water absorption， and perspiration when they flow through fabrics or other materials, helping textile manufacturers figure out their fabric materials’ ability to deal with moisture and predict the perspiration capacity of textiles in the real usage.

The moisture meters evaluate absorption performance by measuring changes in electrical conductivity. Firstly, we need to place the specimen horizontally between the upper and lower sensors equipped with concentric pins and put a drop of the prepared solution on the center of the upper surface of the specimen. Next, we need to measure and record the change in electrical resistance as the solution flows over the whole specimen. The data of the resistance is used to calculate the moisture content. Once the results are available, the fabric will be graded on the basis of water absorption by comparing the predetermined indices.

The Moisture Management Tester, which can test the conveying performance of the dynamic liquid of textiles such as knitted and woven fabrics and non-woven fabrics, is mainly used to test the following three properties of products.

1)Absorption rate
the time needed to absorb moisture on the inside and outside surfaces of the fabric.
2)Dispersion/drying rate
the speed of diffusion at which liquid moisture spreads on the inner and outer surfaces of the fabric.
3)Unidirectional transfer capability
Single-way transfer of liquid moisture from the inner surface to the outer surface of the fabric. Besides, it is easy and convenient to operate the Moisture Management Tester, making it possible to test the moisture content of the specimen in a quick, steady, and accurate way. The instrument is attached with a transparent protective cover, which can effectively prevent the liquid from spilling during the test.

4. Sweating Guarded Hotplate

As we know, whether the garment is qualified enough mainly depends on the fact that the wearers feel comfortable. We will feel uncomfortable if heat and moisture from the body fail to flow freely due to the materials of the fabrics. Fortunately, we can test the thermal and moisture resistance performance of various textiles in the way of simulating the environment of our skins by applying a Sweating Guarded Hotplate. According to the testing results, we can test the comfort of the textiles. It is composed of a human skin simulation test board, automatic water supply system, wind speed stabilization system, test host, and so on. It is also equipped with an environmental chamber, which can closely control the temperature and humidity to ensure that there is the specific and required hardware for testing.

The principle of the test:
A fixed aluminum or copper plate will be heated in a standard testing atmosphere until it reaches a certain and constant temperature. And then you can test the heating power. Similarly, after the experiment board is covered with testing fabrics, we can test the heating power of testing fabrics under the same situation. Finally, you can determine the thermal resistance or moisture resistance value of the test specimen according to the differential power between the testing board and the area of the test plate. The larger the thermal and moisture resistance value of the garment is, the stronger it is to impede the flow of body heat and moisture, which also means the less comfortable it is.

5. Hydrostatic Head Tester

Hydrostatic pressure tester, also known as hydrostatic pressure tester, is mainly used to measure the resistance of the fabric to water penetration under hydrostatic pressure.
Under the standard atmospheric pressure, the fabric withstands a continuous rise in water pressure, until there are water droplets on the back of the fabric. Meanwhile, the water pressure value you measure is what we call hydrostatic pressure. The larger the hydrostatic pressure that the fabric can withstand, the better the waterproofness or resistance to leakage is. For different fabric materials, there are different test methods. A hydrostatic head tester can be used to test many fabrics and films, including canvas, coated cloth, cover cloth, rainproof clothing, and geotextiles. And it is commonly used in outdoor sportswear waterproof tests, waterproof fabric tests, liquid permeability of protective materials consisting of medical protective clothing, and blood permeability test.

The principle of the test:
The specimen is fixed on the specified testing area. And then you need to put 0-5 bar of air into a tank filled with distilled water by using an air compressor and apply the water under a certain pressure to the specimen. A test can be performed based on either dynamic or static methods.
(1) dynamic method: testing the pressure of the specimen when there are some specified water droplets on it due to the pressure which increases at a constant speed without any contact with water.
(2) static method: testing the water penetration of the specimen which is under fixed pressure for a certain period of time.

6. Air Permeability Tester

As we can see, the breathability of testers plays a key role in forming comfortable fabrics. There are some high requirements for sportswear and wind-and cold-proof clothes for some industrial fabrics such as aircraft parachutes and filter cloth. Air permeability tester is widely used to test the resistance of fabrics to the passage of air (airflow), such as woven, knitted, and non-woven textile materials, and medical masks. The principle of testing breathability is to figure out the amount of air flowing through the fabric per unit of time under certain pressure when air penetrates vertically through the fabric and make differential pressure between the back and front of the fabric.

Air Permeability Tester can be used to test a variety of fabrics, such as woven fabric, non-woven fabric, airbag fabric, blankets, fleece fabric, knitted fabric, multi-layer fabric, and cotton lint fabrics. It can also test the airflow flowing through viscous thick and elastic porous objects, such as polyurethane foam.

The test process: you need to take steps as follows.
1)  cut the prepared and standard specimen into the required size at first.
2)  select the fixing circle of the specimen carefully and install it on the tester.
3)  push the button of the nozzle.
4) turn on the power of the instrument and set the parameters before starting.
5) put on the startup button to operate the tester.
6) the tester will press the specimen tightly and begin to test the breathability. When it reaches the set differential pressure, the tester will automatically release the specimen, calculate the data and stop operating.
7) Continue to test another specimen and make a data process until there are enough valid times of testing( the current times will be displayed on the screen). You can print the testing result or observe it on the display screen of breathability and differential pressure.

7. Multi-Purpose Flammability Tester

Nowadays, the test and research about textile combustion resistance have become a widespread concern at home and abroad. The textile combustion resistance is not only related to the types of fiber, dyes, and various finishing agents but also its structure, form, and environmental conditions of burning as well as atmospheric temperature and humidity. Multi-functional combustion tester is created to test the flammability of various textile materials. For example, it can do the test about vertical directional flame spread performance of garments, curtains, drapery, and large tents including cool tents, door covers of textile, and the burning time of the textile fabric whose surface is covered with pile (such as fluffy, terry, tufting or similar surface).

The principle of the test:
The finished sampling or material sampling is mounted on the corresponding fixture of this tester and is burned for a certain period of time with the prescribed flame to measure the relevant data (such as burning time, and burning rate) so that you can evaluate its combustion performance.
There are numerous methods to test combustion performance. However, a popular-accepted measuring method has not been put forward for testing the combustion performance so far. Besides, all methods are used to test the relative combustion of the specimen semi-quantitatively.

8. Washing Fastness Tester

The color fastness of textile is a conventional textile test project. Based on different requirements and simulation scenarios, color fastness testing can generally be divided into conventional washing color fastness testing, sweat fastness testing, wet and dry Mo testing, sunlight fastness testing, chlorine bleaching fastness, and saliva fastness, and so on.
And washing color fastness refers to the degree of fading about the coloring fabric after soaping in a specified environment which can be tested based on the original fading and staining of white cloth. The original fading relates to the degree of fading of coloring fabric before or after soaping; white cloth staining means that white cloth and coloring fabric are sewn together in a certain way and then the white cloth stains by the fading of coloring fabric after soaping. The degree of fading or staining should be tested under the specified light source and measured by the standard gray card rating. The testing results can be divided into 5 levels. Level 5 stands for the best while level 1 means the worst. Nowadays, the standard of test methods at home and abroad for this project is relatively complete, but the equipment and technical conditions are not the same.

The principle of the test:
configure the specimen according to the standard (if it is a white cloth staining test, you need to sew the specimen with white cloth)→ then configure the soap met with the standard and methods →next wash it in a specific and standard way → clean and dry it → finally, rate it with gray sample card or instrument.

9. Laboratory Conditioning Chamber

Laboratory Conditioning Chamber also called the environmental chamber or climatic chamber acts as the environmental simulation system and equipment in the laboratories and factories. Its function is to regulate the temperature and humidity and do high-and-low-temperature alternating tests of various materials before testing. The temperature, humidity, and time of the test can be programmed by the Laboratory Conditioning Chamber. Furthermore, during the testing process, the environmental chamber can modulate the customized temperature and humidity required by many testing instruments (including textile testing instruments), assisting in obtaining more accurate testing results related to the testing instruments. Now, let’s figure out how well the conditioning chamber works.
1)Perfect simulation. Within a certain tolerance, it is possible to simulate the external environment in which products are used, stored, and transported.
2）Trial and error. The same product can be tested several times by an environmental testing chamber or different environmental testing chambers. By repeating the process, we can achieve more comparable test results even though we put the same products into the same laboratory environment.
3)Under great control. You can adjust the environmental parameters freely when using this chamber. That is to say, you can protect the products from being damaged and eliminate the uncontrolled environmental conditions by limiting the environmental parameters to a certain tolerance range for ensuring the accuracy of the simulation.
4)Wide range of applications. Specifically, constant temperature and humidity boxes can be used in quality testing of daily production life, electronics, electrical, communications, instruments, vehicles, plastic products, metal, food, chemical, building materials, medical, aerospace, sanitary ware, and so on.
5) Extraordinary safety performance. An environmental chamber is characterized by a safe and reliable operation, long service life, and so on. Environmental testing equipment is also set up inside a variety of protection devices, alarm systems, and safety interlocks.

In a word, the laboratory environmental chamber can accurately simulate the complex natural environment of high temperature, extreme temperature, and humidity, low temperature, and humidity. Therefore, it can test the cold resistance, thermal resistance, dry resistance, and humidity resistance of the products to make them more durable.

10. Infrared Lab Dyeing Machine

The infrared experimental dyeing machine, also known as infrared small sample dyeing machine, is a general laboratory dyeing equipment, which can be used to test dyeing and washing fastness or other features of dyeing knitted fabric, woven fabric, yarn, cotton, loose fiber, zipper, shoe mesh and other specimens of high temperature.
It is designed for the dyeing industry, chemical industry, raw materials, cloth industry, and high-temperature dyeing sample machine. Besides, we can accurately simulate the real production conditions, and test the degree of easy dyeing of the materials for achieving the required process effect with the help of this machine. Furthermore, this machine heats the materials by infrared without other media and thus it can control the temperature more precisely.
The main advantages are as follows.
1）Rapid response
2）Cost-saving operation
3）High-efficiency heating
4）Uniform heat transmission
5）Ability to measure the actual temperature in the dye cup
6）Easy to clean without smoke or pollution in the workspace