The objective of this work was to develop a pre-treatment (cleaning) procedure for a wide range of apparel fabrics and to determine whether differences observed in the properties of fabrics which had and had not been pre-treated were significant. Properties relevant to the manufacture and/or performance of apparel included mass per unit area, thickness, bending length, flex-ural rigidity, drape coefficient, air permeability, water vapor permeability, liquid absorptive capacity, drying time, ‘dry’ thermal resistance, ultra-violet transmission. Results for the same property on the same fabric measured when the fabrics had and had not been pre-treated generally differed significantly, confirming the importance of pre-treatment prior to measuring these properties, particularly when claiming in-use attributes of fabrics. A procedure for pre-treatment is recommended: six consecutive cleaning cycles following procedure 8A of British Standard EN ISO 6330: 2001 (i.e. not dried between cycles), and dried flat following procedure C of this standard.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 12127:1998, “Determi-nation of Mass Per Unit Area Using Small Samples,”British Standards Institution, London , 1998.
2.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 13158:2000, “Protective Clothing - Protective Jackets, Body and Shoulder Protectors for Horse Riders - Requirements and Test Methods,”British Standards Institution, London , 2000.
3.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 14120:2003, “Protective Clothing - Wrist, Palm, Knee and Elbow Protectors for Users of Roller Sports Equipment - Requirements and Test Methods,”British Standards Institution, London , 2003.
4.
British Standards Institution , BS EN ISO 6330:2001, “Textiles - Domestic Washing and Drying Procedures for Textile Testing,”British Standards Institution, London , 2001.
5.
Higgins, L. , Anand, S. C. , Holmes, D. A. , Hall, M. E. , and Underly, K. , Effects of Various Home Laundering Practices on the Dimensional Stability, Wrinkling, and Other Properties of Plain Woven Cotton Fabrics. Part 1: Experimental Overview, Reproducibility of Results, and Effect of Detergent , Textile Res. J.73(4), 357-366 (2003).
6.
Quaynor, L. , Dimensional Changes in Knitted Silk and Cotton Fabrics with Laundering , Textile Res. J.69. (4), 285-291 (1999).
7.
Wang, S. Q , Kopf, A. W , Marx, J. , Bogdan, A. , Polsky, D. , and Bart, R. S. , Reduction in Ultraviolet Transmission through Cotton T-Shirt Fabrics with Low Ultraviolet Protection by Various Laundering Methods and Dyeing: Clinical Implications , J. Am. Acad. Dermatol.44(5), 767-774 (2001).
8.
Stanford, D. G. , Georgouras, K. E. , and Pailthorpe, M. T. , Sun Protection by a Summer Weight Garment - the Effect of Washing and Wearing , Med. J. Aust.162(8), 422-425 (1995).
9.
British Standards Institution , BS 7971-1: 2002, “Protective Clothing and Equipment for Use in Violent Situations and in Training - Part 1: General Requirements,”British Standards Institution, London , 2002.
10.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 13594: 2002, “Protective Gloves for Professional Motorcycle Riders - Requirements and Test Methods,”British Standards Institution, London , 2002.
11.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 11393-4: 2003, “Protective Clothing for Users of Hand Held Chain-Saws - Part 4: Test Methods and Performance Requirements for Protective Gloves,”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 2003.
12.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 13999-2: 2003, “Protective Clothing - Gloves and Arm Guards Protecting against Cuts and Stabs by Hand Knives - Part 2: Gloves and Arm Guards Made of Material Other Than Chain Mail,”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 2003.
13.
Standards Australia and Standards New Zealand , AS/NZS 4399:1996, “Sun Protective Clothing - Evaluation and Classification,”Standards Australia and Standards New Zealand, Homebush Australia, Wellington New Zealand , 1996.
14.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 420: 2003, “Protective Gloves - General Requirements and Test Methods,”British Standards Institution, London , 2003.
15.
British Standards Institution BS EN 12477: 2001, “Protective Gloves for Welders,”British Standards Institution, London , 2001.
16.
British Standards Institution , BS EN 20139:1992; ISO 139:1973, “Textiles - Standard Atmospheres for Conditioning and Testing,”British Standards Institution, London , 1992.
17.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 5084:1996, “Textiles - Determination of Thickness of Textiles and Textile Products,”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 1996.
18.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 3759: 1994, “Textiles - Preparation, Marking and Measuring of Fabric Specimens and Garments in Tests for Determination of Dimensional Change,”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 1994.
19.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 5077:1984, “Textiles - Determination of Dimensional Change in Washing and Drying,”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 1984.
20.
British Standards Institution , BS 3356:1990, “Determination of Bending Length and Flexural Rigidity of Fabrics,”British Standards Institution, London , 1990.
21.
British Standards Institution , BS 5058:1973, “Method for the Assessment of Drape of Fabrics,”British Standards Institution, London , 1973.
22.
British Standards Institution , BS EN ISO 9237:1995, “Textiles - Determination of the Permeability of Fabrics to Air,”British Standards Institution, London , 1995.
23.
British Standards Institution , BS 7209:1990, “British Standard Specification for Water Vapour Permeable Apparel Fabrics,”British Standards Institution, London , 1990.
24.
British Standards Institution , BS EN ISO 9073-6:2003, “Tex-tiles - Test Methods for Nonwovens - Part 6: Absorption,”British Standards Institution, London , 2003.
25.
International Organization for Standardization , ISO 11092: 1993, “Textiles - Physiological Effects - Measurement of Thermal and Water-Vapour Resistance under Steady-State Conditions (Sweating Guarded-Hotplate Test),”International Organization for Standardization, Geneva , 1993.
26.
National Fire Protection Association , “NFPA: 1971 Protective Clothing for Structural Fire Fighting - Appendix B,”National Fire Protection Association, USA, Quincy, MA , 1990.
27.
McCullough, E. A. , “Report to ASTM Subcommittee F 23.60 on Human Factors Interlaboratory Testing of ASTM F 1865: The Sweating Hot Plate Methods,”Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas , 2002.
28.
SPSS Inc. , “Statistical Package for Social Sciences,”SPSS Inc., Chicago , 2001.
29.
Tukey, J. W. , “Exploratory Data Analysis,”Addison-Wesley, Massachusetts , 1977.
30.
Welch, B. L. , The Significance of the Difference between Two Means When the Population Variances Are Unequal , Biometrika29350-362 (1938).
31.
Brown, M. B. , and Forsythe, A. B ,, The Small Sample Behaviour of Some Statistics Which Test the Equality of Several Means , Technometrics16(1), 129-132 (1974).
32.
Nelson, P. R , and Dudewicz, E. J. , Exact Analysis of Means with Unequal Variances , Technometrics44(2), 152-160 (2002).
33.
Welch, B. L. , On the Comparison of Several Mean Values: An Alternative Approach , Biometrika38330-336 (1951).
34.
Day, R. W. , and Quinn, G. P. , Comparisons of Treatments after an Analysis of Variance in Ecology , Ecol. Monogr.59(4), 433-463 (1989).
