GB2188566A - Interlining materials - Google Patents

Abstract

Interlining materials comprise a fabric layer bearing on one or both of its surfaces, a coating of a heat-fusible, water soluble polymer which is (i) a high molecular weight polyalkylene oxide (ii) a vinyl pyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymer, or (iii) a hydroxy propyl cellulose.

Description

SPECIFICATION Interlining materials The present invention is concerned with interlining materials capable of forming a temporary bond.

Interlining materials which can be permanently bonded by heat and pressure to fabrics are widely used in making up collars and cuffs of shirts and blouses; such interlinings provide a degree of stiffness which is desirable or required in conventional collars and cuffs. Such interlinings are permanently bonded in the sensethattheiradhesive bond to the adjacentfabricorfabricscanwithstand laundering.

A different requirement is raised by current fashion trends towards softer and less stiff collars and cuffs for mens shirts and womens blouses. The fabrics used for making these garments are thinner and/or more loosely woven than conventional shirt and blouse fabrics and as such are difficult to machine stitch. It would be advantageous to have available an interlining material which could be temporary adhered to the cut parts of such collars and cuffs so that the latter could be presented in a semi-rigid condition to the sewing apparatus thus eliminating or greatly reducing stitch-pucker. The bonding of such an interlining material should be temporary in the sense that the bond to the adjacent fabric would be destroyed in the first laundering of the garment.

An interlining material providing such a temporary bond could also be used to make blouse collars in two parts and to eliminate the conventional turning operations; thus such an interlining could be used on each side of the collar in a folding machine and the collar closed together without turning. Again the bonding of the interlining would be eliminated in the first laundering to give a desirable soft collarwhich had been produced without the costly turning operation.

Interlining materials capable offorming a temporary bond were available and used in the 1950's and 1 960's; these were materials coated with water-activated and water-soluble adhesives such as starch and dextrin. The need to damp or wet the interlining material in orderto stickittothefabric gave rise to production difficulties and the use of such interlining materials was gradually abandoned.

We have now developed a range of interlining materials which can be adhered to fabrics by heat and pressure, that is without being dampened or wetted, the bond so formed being destroyed in a normal laundering operation. These materials are based upon the selection of particular polymeric materials which have an unusual combination of properties, that is they are both heat-activatable adhesives and water-soluble.

According to the present invention, there is provided an interlining material which comprises a fabric layer bearing on one or both of its surfaces a coating of a heat-fusible, water-soluble polymer which is (i) a high molecular weight polyalkylene oxide, (ii) a vinyl pyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymer, or (iii) a hydroxypropyl cellulose.

The fabric layer of the interlining may be any woven or non-woven fabric which is suitable for use as an interlining, that is to say it should be compatible with the polymeric adhesive with which it is coated, it should be unaffected by the temperatures required to meltthe polymer, and it should have the required properties of stiffness when coated with the polymer and of softness/flexibilitywhen the polymer has been washed out. Awide range of conventional interlining fabrics, such as non-wovens made from viscose fibres, are suitable for use in the present invention.

Suitable polyalkyiene oxides for use as the polymeric adhesive are polyethylene oxides having a sufficiently high molecularweightto have some cohesive strength when fused and then solidified, but not such a high molecularweightthatthe melting temperature is undesirably high. With all the polymeric adhesives used according to the invention, the preferred melting range is from 1 000two 13000 since this range of temperatures corresponds to the temperatures rapidly attained within a fabric assembly which is subjected to treatment in the fusing presses and folding machines conventionally used in the garment industry, such machines usually being operated at a nominal temperature of 120"to 15000.

On this basis, the preferred polymeric adhesives of this type are polyethylene oxides having a molecular weightoffrom 100,000 or 200,000.

Preferred vinyl pyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymers for use in the invention are those containing from 50 to 60% by weight of vi nyl pyrrolidone and from 50 to 40% by weight ofvinyl acetate. Such copolymers will normally have too high a melting range and it is necessary to plasticise them with suitable plasticisers to reduce their melting range to 1 000 to 1 300C. Suitable plasticisers are for example, dibutyl phthalate, cyclohexyl phthalate and isooctyl phthalate, and a variety of polyhydroxy compounds, such as ethylene glycol, polyethylene glycol and sorbitol. The phthalate plasticiers are generally preferred; they are suitably used in a proportion of 1 to 10% by weight, based on the copolymer, preferably in a proportion of about 5% by weight.

The hydroxypropyl cellulose used in accordance with the invention preferably has a molecularweight of 60,000 to 1,000,000. This polymer is commercially available from Hercules Powder Company underthe trade mark "Klucel"; Klucel Grades L, E and J areall suitable for use in the present invention, Grade L being particularly preferred.

It is a characteristic of hydroxypropyl cellulose that it is soluble in cold and moderately warm water, that is water having a temperature up to about 50"C, but it forms a gel in the presence of water at higher temperatures, that is 60"C and above. It is important, therefore, that the first laundering of a garment containing interlining material comprising this polymer should include an adequate period of contact with water at a temperature below 50"C. This is, of course, provided by the conventional wash programmes of domestic washing machines.

Hydroxypropyl cellulose as described above is currently the preferred polymeric adhesive for use according to the invention.

The fabric layer of the interlining material may be coated with the polymeric adhesive in any suitable way. It is particularly preferred to effect this coating step by scatter coating of the polymeric adhesive in powderform using conventional scatter coating apparatus. For scatter coating, it is preferred that the particle size of the polymer shou Id be from 150 to 500 ,am, more preferably300 to 500 ym. The "KIucel" hydroxypropyl cellulose referred to above is supplied in this particle size range and is therefore well adapted to scatter coating.

Other suitable polymeric adhesives may not be commercially available in such particle sizes. Where the polymer is commercially available in smaller particle sizes, it may be subjected to am agglomeration treatmentto form agglomerates having a particle size in the above range; where the polymer is only available in larger particle sizes, it may be subjected to a suitable attrition or grinding process to obtain a suitable reduced particle size.

Whilstscattercoating is the preferred coating procedure, other methods can be used. Thus coating may be effected by spray coating with an aqueous, alcoholic or aqueous alcoholic solution of the polymeric adhesive, or by dip coating the fabric in such a solution. Dip coating is, in general, the least preferred coating method since its use tends to impregnate the interlining fabricthroughout its thickness with the polymeric adhesive and it is then more difficult to remove the adhesive in the first laundering.

Whilst the amount of polymeric adhesive to be applied to the interlining fabric will depend on the particular polymer and fabric in question and on the strength of the temporary bond which it is wished to obtain,we havefoundthatin thecase of interlining materials coated on one side only, a suitable coating rate is generally about 1 0g of polymeric adhesive per square metre and in the case of materials coated on both sides, is generally from 5 to 7 g/m2 on each side, that is from 10to 14g/m2intotal.

Interlining materials according to the invention can be adhered to fabrics in a conventional fusing press, typically operating at a temperature of 120 - 1 500C, either before or after the fabric has been cut out. They provide the fabric, particularly one which is thin and/or loosely woven, with a desirable degree of stiffness for presentation to a sewing machine. The interlining materials are typically used in the making of collars and cuffs, as previously mentioned, and generally in the making up of any parts of garments involving the sewing of small pieces offabric, such as patch pockets, epaulettes, and the like.

The interlining materials can also be advantageously used in applications where they are not adhered over the whole of their surface to a fabric, but only in a restricted area. A particular example ofthis kind of application is in the making up of collars.

In this procedure, the collar fabric is cut outto form a collar piece (to form the eventual inside or outside ofthe collar) comprising an extra marginal portion which, when folded over, leaves the desired final collardimensions.The collar piece is laid upwithan interlining material according to the invention which has been coated on both sides and which has the same shape and dimensions as the collar piece. The laid up collar piece and interlining are then presented to a conventional folding machine as used in the garment industry and the marginal portions are folded over (with the interlining on the inside) with heat and pressure. The heat is sufficient to adhere the folded over portions and thus to secure the interlining material to the collar piece.

This assembly is then arranged with another similar assembly comprising the other half, outside or inside, of the collar and the two assemblies presented to a sewing machine to complatethe making up of the collar. Alternatively an assembly with interlining can be laid up with a collar piece which has simply had its marginal portions folded over as described above; this alternative is used when the presence of a single layer of interlining in one ofthe collar pieces is sufficientto provide adequate stiffness to facilitate the sewing operation.

Claims (8)

1. An interlining material which comprises a fabric layer bearing on one or both of its surfaces, a coating of a heat-fusible, water-soluble polymer which is (i) a high molecularweight polyakylene oxide, (ii) a vinyl pyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymer, or (iii) a hydroxy propyl cellulose.

2. A material according to claim 1, in which the heat-fusible, water-soluble polymer has a melting range of from 1000two 1 30".

3. A material according to claim 1 or 2, in which the polyalkylene oxide is a polyethylene oxide having a molecular weight offrom 100,000 to 200,000.

4. A material according to claim 1 or 2, in which the vinyl pyrrolidone-vinyl acetate copolymer is derived from 50 to 60% by weight of vinyl pyrrolidone and 50to 40% byweightofvinyl acetate, and contains sufficient plasticiser so that its melting range is from 1000 to 1300C.

5. A material according to claim 1, in which the copolymer contains from 1 to 10% by weight, based on the copolymer, of dibutyl phthalate, cyclohexyl phthalate or isooctyl phthalate as plasticiser.

6. A material according to claim 1 or 2, in which the hydroxypropyl cellulose has a molecular weight of from 60,000 to 1,000,000.

7. A material according to any of claims 1 to 6, in which one surface ofthe fabric layer is coated with the polymer at a rate of about 10 g/m2.

8. A material according to any of ciaims 1 to 6, in which both surfaces ofthefabric layer are coated with the polymer at a rate of 5 to 7 g/m2 on each side.