Flax fiber is the bast fiber under the epidermis of flax stem in panicum miliaceum. Flax fiber is the earliest natural plant fiber used by human beings, with a history of more than 10,000 years.
Flax fiber has the unique advantages of high strength, strong hygroscopicity, rapid heat dissipation, friction resistance, high temperature resistance, non-flammability, non-cracking, low conductivity, low dust absorption rate, antibacterial and health care, etc. It is suitable for making airplane wing cloth, military cloth, fire fighting, aerospace, medical and health care clothing and canvas, hose, indoor decorative cloth and craft embroidery. However, it also has some disadvantages, such as easy folding, poor dyeability, rough hand feeling and poor drapability.
Advantages of flax fiber
1.Good perspiration and ventilation effect
The natural spindle structure and unique pectin hypotenuse structure of flax fiber make it have the excellent characteristics of absorbing more water, absorbing moisture quickly, and ventilating. Linen fabric can absorb as much as 20% of its own weight, which is the highest among fiber fabrics with the same density.
The water absorption rate of flax fabric is much faster than that of other fabrics, and when flax fabric comes into contact with skin, it can produce capillary phenomenon, which can help skin to sweat quickly. Flax fiber is a bundle of flax single cells bonded together by glue, which has not much space to store air, high air permeability and excellent thermal conductivity, that is, air permeability.
2. Fast heat dissipation and cooling speed
Linen fiber fabric has excellent temperature regulation function, which is due to the unique structure of flax fiber. Its spindle-shaped structure and pectin hypotenuse structure enable it to adjust the ecological temperature environment of human skin surface layer in time with the change of environmental conditions. Because it is warm in winter and cool in summer, flax fiber fabric is often used for car cushions, short-sleeved T-shirts and other purposes, and is known as "natural air conditioning".
3. Strong bacteriostatic and health-care functions
Flax fiber not only has unique fragrance and fiber structure, but also contains a certain amount of excellent natural antiseptic silicon dioxide, which makes flax fiber have good antibacterial properties. Under normal circumstances, dry flax fiber has very strong antibacterial ability, and basically does not mildew, except in extremely warm and humid environment, mold will invade flax fiber.
4. Good antistatic performance
In terms of anti-static, man-made fibers such as polyester and nylon have the worst effect, and it is easy to generate static electricity when rubbed in a dry environment, while natural fibers generally have better anti-static effect than man-made fibers. Among them, flax fibers carry positive and negative charges close to balance, and have the best anti-static performance, and almost no static phenomenon occurs. Even if the fabric contains only a small amount of flax fibers, it can play a very good anti-static role.
5. Good ultraviolet protection performance
All kinds of fiber fabrics can protect the wearer from ultraviolet rays to a certain extent, but under the condition that all kinds of fiber fabrics have not undergone special anti-ultraviolet treatment, flax fiber fabrics have the best ultraviolet protection performance, because flax fiber fabrics contain as much as 30% hemicellulose, which can absorb a lot of ultraviolet rays, and its protection performance is several times higher than that of cotton fibers, which can better protect the skin from ultraviolet rays.
6. Good flame retardant performance
Flax fiber has the best flame retardant effect among all textile fibers, which is why flax fiber can be widely used in fire fighting, aviation, aerospace, architectural decoration and other fields with high requirements for flame retardant. For example, fire hoses and fire suits are all made of linen fiber, and many hotel rooms are decorated with linen. The biggest factor is its excellent flame retardant performance.
7. Good antiallergic performance
Shortcomings of flax fiber
1. Easy to wrinkle
Flax fiber is a kind of natural fiber with high strength and toughness, but it has no elasticity. Fabrics made of other materials can usually recover slowly after deformation, but the speed is different. However, once flax fiber fabric is deformed for a long time, it cannot recover, and it will produce obvious wrinkles, which will affect its beauty and use.
2. Poor dyeing performance
Textile fabrics have an extremely important process, that is, dyeing and finishing. The crystallinity and orientation of flax fibers are high, so the swelling of flax fibers is difficult, which directly leads to the difficulty of dye infiltration when flax fibers are dyed. In addition, flax fibers also contain a lot of impurities such as pectin, which leads to low dye uptake and poor uniformity of flax dyeing.
3. Coarse fiber and poor fabric flatness
There are many hairiness on the surface of flax fiber, which causes the surface of flax fabric to be rough. If it is not handled well, it will seriously affect the comfort level and even make the wearer feel itchy. At the same time, the cross section of flax fiber is irregular polygon, so the thickness of flax fiber is particularly uneven, resulting in poor flatness of flax cloth and poor compactness of fabric fiber.
Some applications of flax fiber
1. Cool clothes in summer
Linen clothing is quite crisp, and it is very cool and breathable in summer. The heat dissipation performance of flax fiber is much better than that of other kinds of fibers. In hot weather, wearing flax clothing can make people's skin surface temperature 3-4℃ lower than wearing other fiber clothing. At the same time, flax fiber fabric can absorb more sweat and quickly discharge sweat to keep people dry and comfortable.
2. Interior decoration material
Linen fiber fabric has the advantages of naturalness, simplicity, natural color and noble temperament. Linen decoration is very suitable for the popular fashion style of contemporary interior decoration, which is durable and durable, and has become more and more popular in recent years. Linen fabrics are often used as covers and cushions for wall covering, curtains, tablecloths, curtains and indoor appliances, etc. These decorations are made of flax, which not only become practical daily necessities, but also become very artistic handicrafts and the most advanced home decoration.
