TEXTILES AND CLOTHING

by Chris Byrne
Mediatex/TechniTex

The scope of technical textiles

The term “technical textiles” was coined in the 1980s to describe the growing variety of products and manufacturing techniques being developed primarily for their technical properties and performance rather than their appearance or other aesthetic characteristics. It largely superseded an earlier term “industrial textiles” (still widely used in the USA) which had become too restrictive in its meaning to describe the full complexity and richness of this fast growing area. A major international exhibition, TechTextil, was launched in 1985 to reflect the growth of technical textiles and soon developed a simple taxonomy that has been used ever since to describe the scope of this new industry and market sector.

Within each of these headings are literally hundreds of products and applications for textiles, some traditional, some replacing other well-established materials and techniques, and some that have been newly created by the unique properties and capabilities of textile materials and structures.

The automotive industry is not only one of the largest single markets for technical textiles but also one of the most diverse. Applications range from tyre cord, hose and drive belt reinforcements to thermal and sound insulation, safety belts and airbags, filters, cable harnesses and textile reinforced composites for body and suspension parts. Even the internal furnishings of a car – headliners, seating, carpets, parcel shelf and trunk liners – are all regarded as technical textiles because of the extremely demanding specifications to which they are made and tested.

As just one other example, the medical and hygiene textiles market ranges from high volume disposable products for babies’ nappies, feminine hygiene and adult incontinence through to extremely specialised and high value textile products for use in blood filtration, surgical sutures, prostheses and, most recently, scaffolds for new tissue growth.

The economic importance of technical textiles

The technical textiles sector in the UK alone is worth £1.3 billion per year and at least double that in terms of downstream processing and fabrication activities. Worldwide, technical textiles account for 25-30% of all textile manufacturing and approaching 50% in some regions.

Most advanced textile economies (now including the likes of China, South Korea and Taiwan) have embraced technical textiles as a new source of growth and as an alternative to low added-value, mass production textiles and clothing. Indeed, as the technology and functionality of these textiles increase, including combinations with other materials such as metals, ceramics, polymer films, foams and powders, many technical textile producers are now seeking to redefine themselves as part of a new advanced flexible materials industry, adopting new manufacturing techniques and addressing new markets which have little in common with their traditional activities. Likewise, many manufacturers from completely outside the textile sector are adopting textile and fibre-based materials and techniques wherever they see these as appropriate but without ever regarding themselves as part of the textiles industry.

Meanwhile, many of the technologies and products of this advanced materials sector are diffusing across into consumer applications. The first generation of such ‘performance’ products were the membranes and breathable coatings of protective clothing textiles, first introduced into high-end ski and out-door wear but now almost an everyday component of leisure clothing. Similarly, a growing range of ‘well-being’ textiles have evolved from products initially developed for medical and other technical applications, in combination with innovative technologies such as microencapsulation and nanotechnology.

Beyond technical textiles

The new promise of technical and performance textiles is an emerging generation of products combining the latest developments in advanced flexible materials with advances in computing and communications technology, biomaterials, nanotechnology and novel process technologies such as plasma treatment.

These will eventually have a direct impact upon all sorts of consumer textile markets, including both clothing and furnishings. The field of ‘wearable electronics’ has already captured the imagination of many researchers and large corporations and, although most products on the market today are relatively unsophisticated ‘implants’ of conventional electronics and wiring, the prospect of truly ‘interactive textiles embodying sensors, actuators and logic circuits built into the structure of the fibres, yarns and fabrics themselves is not impossibly far-fetched.

‘Technical textiles’ already sounds a terribly antiquated and inadequate term to describe much of what is going on in this exciting new market.