Optimisation of shirt fabrics’ composition from the point of view of their appearance and thermal comfort

Abstract

Abstract In this paper, the thermal contact comfort of a suddenly wetted shirt and some selected mechanical parameters of ten various woven shirt fabrics were measured with the aim of determining the effect of their composition on their complex quality level. In order to explain the thermal contact comfort of superficially wetted shirts, a new parameter called moisture absorptivity was introduced and a simple equation of the moisture transfer between the fabric and skin was derived. Since the direct measurement of the moisture absorptivity is complicated, an indirect method for its experimental determination was described and used for evaluation of thermal comfort. As regards the final complex evaluation of the measured shirt fabrics, it was found that shirts containing 25‐40 per cent of classical PES fibres blended with cotton, compared with non‐treated pure cotton shirts, have shown similar or even better water vapour permeability, fairly warmer feeling in dry state, better shear, fairly better ability to keep the form and a bit lower moisture absorptivity (worse thermal contact comfort feeling in the case of superficial wetting). Moreover, thermal comfort properties may be still improved by the application of special modified PES fibres.