Investigation of the Effect of Yarn Locations on Color Properties of Polyester Automotive Upholstery Woven Fabrics after Abrasion

Abstract

Automobile upholstery fabrics are regularly exposed to various deformations because of their usage conditions in the cars. Abrasion, being one of these deformations, occurs by various rubbing forces such as sitting, cleaning, etc. In addition to the physical deformations occurring in the structure of fabrics, such as fiber and yarn breakage, pilling or rupture by force, changes in appearance and consequently color differences are possible results of rubbing. In this study, polyester woven fabrics that are used in the automotive industry as car interior furnishing were investigated at different abrasion levels (500, 5000, 10,000 and 20,000) and changes in color and percentage reflectance values were determined. The polyester fabrics differed from each other by their warp and weft densities, warp and weft yarn counts and fabric weave patterns. The fabric that has been abraded in each level was compared with its original state and reflectance and color difference values were determined. It was observed that surface color coordinates changed as the yarn float length of the different weave patterns changed and color differences increased as the yarn float lengths increased. Compact fabric structures with high yarn crossing numbers (yarn intersections) were found resistant to the effects of abrasion in color terms. It was concluded that the fiber ends which occurred on the fabric surfaces after abrasion affected the reflectance behavior of the surfaces in different manners regarding the compactness of woven structures.