Before launching in the market, a product must undergo rigorous testing to identify and remove any flaws. The same goes for clothing items; textile clothing testing guarantees that the materials are safe for consumers, maintain quality standards, and comply with set regulations.
What Is Textile Testing?
Textile testing is the process of evaluating the quality of textiles throughout their manufacture, from raw materials to the finished product. This guarantees that the entire manufacturing process has been thoroughly examined and evaluated.
Fabric Testing: Who Regulates It?
Textile production generally involves facilities from different countries. Therefore, ISO, ASTM International, and other regional regulatory agencies aim to standardize and improve the textile sector and assure product quality. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) oversees US fabric production, including garment labeling and environmental claims.
What Makes It Important?
Here are the reasons why textile testing is an important step in production:
- Quality Control
Consumers’ three most important factors when choosing a product are quality, comfort, and safety. Testing textiles helps guarantee that they fulfill quality requirements.
- Safe Fabric
This helps ensure that people can wear safe clothes. Some clothing, for instance, can have harmful colors or chemicals. Testing can detect and remove these dangerous compounds from the product.
- Compliance With The Regulations
It ensures textiles meet the set regulations. Public policies often control the quality and safety of textiles. The only way to know if your textiles are legal to sell in your target market is to get them tested. Although every rule doesn’t explicitly mandate testing, it is essential for staying compliant.
- Follow Global Standards
Companies and merchants can use lab testing to ensure their products meet global standards like ASTM, Oeko-Tex, ISO, and en ISO. It also checks that the items are safe for their intended use by meeting all relevant safety regulations.
- Identify Defects
Detecting and addressing any issues with a product before its release onto the market is essential to reducing the risk of liability due to defective material or manufacturing faults. Textile laboratory testing allows retailers and brands to identify product issues, helping them avoid recalls.
- A Marketing Tool
Textile testing can also serve as a promotional strategy. With the confidence of the test results, products can be advertised to consumers as safe and high-quality, boosting sales and enhancing the brand image.
Test Methods For Textiles
There are various types of textile tests to meet different regulations. Here are a few broad categories:
- Physical Testing
Quality assurance specialists examine the fabric’s physical properties when they perform physical testing on textiles. This test is designed to gather as much physical data on a textile sample as possible so buyers can be confident in their purchase. Fibers are identified and evaluated for various properties during physical testing, including weight (GSM), stiffness, fabric count for woven materials, coatings, and more.
- Mechanical Testing
Mechanical textile testing measures fabric strength and durability. Customers want the assurance that their clothing will last as long as promised while still looking great. The most common tests are:
- Tensile Testing: It measures the maximum strain a cloth can sustain under controlled conditions.
- Abrasion Testing: This method involves repeatedly rubbing a cloth to see how well it stays against surface wear and tear.
- Pilling Testing: Checks how well a fabric holds its shape to pilling.
- Chemical Testing
Chemical testing helps verify that textiles are free of hazardous compounds unsafe for human contact. To assure fabric safety, lead and other heavy metals, toxic dyes, phthalates, flammability, and more are tested. In addition to keeping us safe, chemical testing of textile samples can assess pH and color fastness in response to light, heat, and chlorination.
Choosing the Right Textile Tests
The specification of your product will determine the textile test that is best for it. For instance, when making regular clothes, many tests must be run to ensure comfort, durability, and strength. However, extra testing may be required if you are making toy clothes. The following should be considered when choosing textile tests:
- The textile product’s intended use.
- The people who will be buying the fabric.
- The applicable rules and regulations for the garments.
- The product’s manufacturing material.
- The safety concerns related to the item.
- The cost and time efficiency for testing.
- The performance expectation from the product.
These factors can help you choose the right textile test for your product. By working with a reliable third-party textile testing lab, manufacturers can be certain they receive timely and accurate results.
Conclusion
Textile clothing testing is essential to every production phase since it ensures safety, quality, and conformity with regulations. The goal is to ensure your items meet global standards, if not better than what customers expect.
Zhejiang HUAK Testing Technology Co., Ltd. offers compliance and quality assurance services to the global textile industries as an authorized testing lab. Contact us to learn more.
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