Service Soiling of Wool, Man-Made Fiber, and Blended Carpets

Abstract

A comparison of carpets of identical construction made from different fibers or blends in actual service soiling condi tions shows that wool carpets have much superior soiling and soil release in shampooing properties than synthetic fibers and their blends. The merit order of the fibers and blends tested was as follows: wool > wool/nylon 80/20 > > > continuous filament nylon > Evian > Terylene > Evlan/nylon 80/20 > Courtelle/Evlan 50/50 > Courtelle/Evlan/nylon 40/40/20 > ny lon > Courtelle, Acrilan. There was very good agreement between instrumental and visual evaluation of soiling. With all the fibers or blends tested, loop-pile carpets show higher apparent soiling than cut pile carpets, probably because of the higher light scat tering coefficient of the latter.