The Heat of the Afternoon

Photographer Unknown, (Heat of the Afternoon)

“The heat of late afternoon closed in around us like an animate thing; you could feel it on your skin, warm and moist, like a great beast panting. The air was so dense it seemed to require a huge effort even to inhale it. It lay thick in the lungs and seemed to give no refreshment.”

-Geraldine Brooks, March

Fabric Bending Property

Photographer Unknown, (Fabric Bending Property)

Bending Property

The fabric bending property is apparently a function of the bending property of its constituent yarns. Two parameters can be used to measure this property, i.e. B and 2HB. B is bending rigidity, a measure of a fabric ability to resist to a bending deformation. In other words, it reflects the difficulty with which a fabric can be deformed by bending. This parameter is particularly critical in the tailoring of lightweight fabrics. The higher the bending rigidity, the higher the fabric ability to resist when it is bent by an external force, i.e. during fabric manipulation in spreading and sewing. Apart from for the bending rigidity of the constituent yarns and fibers, the mobility of the warp/weft within the fabric also comes into play in this aspect. In addition, the effect of density and fabric thickness are also very profound for this property. 2HB represents the hysteresis of the bending moment. It is a measure of recovery from bending deformations. A lower value of 2HB is supposed to be better.

–Živa Zupin and Krste Dimitrovski, “Mechanical Properties of Fabrics from Cotton and Biodegradable Yarns Bamboo, SPF, PLA in Weft”