Cotton as a dominating natural fibre imparts a major contribution in the whole textile market including natural and artificial fibres. The demand of this cellulosic fibre is increasing rapidly day by day, on the other hand supply cannot fulfill its demand, and as a result price goes higher in world market. Now people are looking for alternatives to cotton in different applications. Viscose as cellulosic origin, the cheapest of all cellulosic fibres could be the best alternative. Viscose fibre exhibits some similar properties compared to cotton except its poor wet strength. In this thesis work different chemical finishes were applied to improve the wet strength of viscose fabric. For this purpose water repellent and soil release finishes were applied. Both water repellent and soil release finishes helped in reducing the molecular barrier around the individual fibres that lowered the surface tension of the fibre. It reduces the absorbency of viscose fibre hence leads to higher wet strength. Water repellent finish was applied alone as well as in combination with soil release finish. It was seen that viscose fibre exhibited better wet strength after applying water repellent and soil release finishes on it. This improved property of viscose could replace the cotton fibre in certain applications like bed linen. / Program: Magisterutbildning i textilteknologi

I arbetet för Vikan AB var uppgiften att undersöka två olika delningsmetoder för mikrofibrer. Vikan AB är ett företag som utvecklar och framställer textila rengöringsredskap i mikrofibrer och tror sig ha kommit på en ny delningsmetod som förhoppningsvis ger en rad fördelar mot den nuvarande metoden. Den nya framställningsmetoden går under arbetsnamnet Easy Split och har ännu inte introducerats på marknaden.Studien har gått ut på att i fyra olika avseenden utvärdera de olika metodernas för- och nackdelar. De olika aspekterna har således varit processgång, utseende, hållbarhet och funktion. Utvärderingen utfördes med hjälp av en rad undersökningar där bland annat tester i absorption, kvadratmetervikt och fläckreduktion ingick.Många av egenskaperna undersöktes med hjälp av befintliga standarder medan undersökningen av fläckreduktionen skedde med en egenutvecklad testmetod. Till denna metod användes en Martindale vars rörelsemönster och tryck är valdes utifrån att göra testmetoden så verklighetstrogen som möjligt. Resultaten visar att det finns en skillnad på de olika metoderna och att de önskvärda egenskaperna finns starkast representerade hos den Easy split- baserade mikrofiberdelningen. De besparingar Vikan kan göra i och med att byta delningsmetod kan ha inverkan på energi- och vattenförbrukningen vilket resulterar i tidsbesparingar och minskade kostnader. / <p>In collaboration with Vikan AB the task has been to examine the different splitting types for microfibers. The company Vikan AB develops and produces textile cleaning products in microfibers and they now seem to have come up with a new splitting method that hopefully will give a range of advantages compared to the present method. The new method goes under the name Easy split and has not yet been introduced to the market.The study consisted of an analysis of the pros and cons of the methods in four different aspects. The different points of view were processing, appearance, durability and function. The investigation was made with a variety of tests including absorption, weight per square meter and stain reduction. Many of the properties were examined with help of existing standard tests while the stain reduction was analyzed with a method developed for this specific purpose. To represent the real environment a Martindale was used because of its uniform moving pattern. The conclusion indicates that the new splitting method not only results in advantages in adsorption, weight and stain reduction but also in water and energy consumption as well as time and expenses.</p><p>Program: Textilingenjörsutbildningen</p>