Study of the materials for thermal insulation in home textiles

Abstract

The thermal insulation in targeted textile substrates for home textiles assumes particular interest nowadays. Increasing performance and decreasing thickness are critical challenges to provide the required comfort to users during their rest period. Thermal insulation is associated with the phenomenon of heat absorption/desorption influencing the insulation value in fibrous material, since fibers absorb or release moisture, depending on their chemical composition. Thus, regarding thermal insulation, there are two major parameters to take into account: the conductivity and heat resistance.

The main objective of this work is to study the performance of different fibrous structures for home textiles applications in terms of thermal insulation. The innovative structures considered within this study include non-woven fabrics produced with wool and hollow polyester fibers incorporating cork. Non-woven structures have been prepared in different compositions including 75%/25% wool and hollow polyester, 50%/50% wool and hollow polyester, blended with 25 mm cork granules size in proportions of 5% and 10% or with an agglomerated cork panel of 0,8mm.

After production, samples were tested for their thermal behavior using Alambeta equipment. Results show that the non-woven composition influences greatly the thermal performance and the best result is obtained for sample with 50/50% wool and hollow polyester.