INTRODUCTION

Fiber is a class of materials that are continuous filaments

or are in discrete elongated pieces, similar to lengths of
thread. A fiber is an elongated tapering thick-walled
plant cell that imparts elasticity, flexibility, and tensile
strength. Tensile strength of fibers can be determined by
hanging weights tied to it and comparing the weight a
string can hold. Traditionally, natural fibers have been
used in all cultures for making utilitarian products.
Different parts of the plant are used. Fibers can be
extracted from the bark (banana, jute, hemp, and ramie),
stem (banana, palm, and bamboo), leaf (palm, screw
pine, sisal, agave), husk (coir), seeds (cotton), and grass
(sikki, madhurkati, benakati, munj). Animal fibers are
obtained from a variety of animal coats, and insect fibers
from cocoons.
Synthetic fibers can often be produced very cheaply and
in large amounts compared to natural fibers, but for
clothing natural fibers can give some benefits, such as
comfort, over their synthetic counterparts.
Types of fibers
Textile materials are made in three stages:
1. spinning: fibers are spun into yarns
2. Weaving or knitting: yarns become fabrics
3. finishing: fabrics are finished to make them more
useful There are two types of textile fibres:
 Natural
 Synthetic

Natural fibers
Natural fibers come from plants, animals and minerals.
They usually have short fibers, called staple fibers. The
exception to this rule is silk, a natural fiber whose
continuous filaments are up to one kilometer in length.
Sources of natural fibers
. Cotton from the cotton plant.
 Linen from the flax plant.
 Wool from sheep.
 Silk from silkworms

Synthetic fibers
Synthetic fibers are man-made, usually from chemical
sources. They are continuous filament fibers, which
means the fibers are long and do not always have to be
spun into yarn.
Sources of synthetic fibers
 Viscose comes from pine trees or petrochemicals.
 Acrylic, nylon and polyester come from oil and coal.

Natural fibers from plants

1)Cotton: Used for making jeans, T-shirts and towels
2)Linen: Used for summer clothing, tea towels and
tablecloths and has the following qualities

Natural fibers from animals

1)Wool Used for jumpers, suits and blankets and has the
following qualities .
2)Silk Used for evening wear and ties
Synthetic fiber.
1) Acrylic: Used for jumpers, fleece jackets and blankets
and has the following qualities
2) Nylon (Tactel): Used for active sportswear, fleece
jackets, socks and seat belts
3) Polyester: Used for raincoats, fleece jackets, children's
nightwear, medical textiles and working clothes

OBJECTIVE

The objective of the project is to determine the strength

of different types of fibers and the effect of alkali and
acid on the tensile strength of the fiber. This project
enables us to know which the appropriate one for the
appropriate use is. One cannot judge the fibre thread by
just looking but can conclude after performing the
following experiments.
 SCOPE AND LIMITATION
As this experiment is carried out to investigate whether
plant fiber under tension are stronger or weaker than
concrete, tensile strength has to be calculated.
Theoretically, tensile strength of plant fiber should be
more than 2.0 x106 N/m2 which is the tensile strength of
concrete. However, there are a few limitations in this
experiment. First, the fiber strands taken from the stem
have different maturity. If extracted from different part
or different plant but of the same species, the strengths
may have big variations. Other than that, in a fiber, the
diameter may be different at different part along the
strand. For example, the end of fiber may have thicker
diameter but thinner in the middle. Besides, when drying
the fiber, the fibre may become over-dried. This will
result in more brittleness in the fiber. Thus the fiber may
snap easily even with the smallest mass of loads and give
a wrong implication on their real tensile strength. The
scope of this project is to study the dependence of the
tensile strength of stone wool fibers on various factors
and to understand the fracture characteristics.
These factors are:
a) Production-related factors:
i. hyper quenching,
ii. ii. Melting atmosphere
iii. . Fiber diameter variations and
Applied axial tension during forming

b) Fiber surfaces characteristics:

i. surface homogeneity,
ii. Surface roughness and
iv. Surface reactivity
These factors are of course highly correlated. The
mechanical performances of both continuous and
discontinuous fibers will be studied by measuring their
tensile strength as functions of the production
parameters.
 THEORY
Depending upon the source, various fibers can be
categorized as:
1. Animal fiber (e.g., silk and wool)
2. Vegetable fiber (e.g., cotton and linen)
3. Synthetic fiber (e.g., nylon and rayon)
Natural fibers can be classified according to their origin.
The vegetable, or cellulose-base, class includes such
important fibers as cotton, flax, and jute;
the animal, or protein-base, fibers include wool, mohair,
and silk; an important fiber in the mineral class is
asbestos. The vegetable fibers can be divided into
smaller groups, based on their origin within the plant.
Cotton, kapok, and coir are examples of fibers originating
as hairs borne on the seeds or inner walls of the fruit,
where each fiber consists of a single, long, narrow cell.
Flax, hemp, jute, and ramie are bast fibers, occurring in
the inner bast tissue of certain plant stems and made up
of overlapping cells. Abaca, henequen, and sisal are
fibers occurring as part of the fibro vascular system of
the leaves. Chemically, all vegetable fibers consist mainly
of cellulose, although they also contain varying amounts
of such substances as hemicelluloses, lignin, pectin, and
waxes that must be removed or reduced by processing.
The animal fibers consist exclusively of proteins and, with
the exception of silk, constitute the furor hair that serves
as the protective epidermal covering of animals. Silk
filaments are extruded by the larvae of moths and are
used to spin their cocoons. With the exception of mineral
fibers, all natural fibers have an affinity for water in both
liquid and vapor form. This strong affinity produces
swelling of the fibers connected with the uptake of
water, which facilitates dyeing in watery solutions. Unlike
most synthetic fibers, all natural fibers are non
thermoplastic—that is, they do not soften when heat is
applied. At temperatures below the point at which they
will decompose, they show little sensitivity to dry heat,
and there is no shrinkage or high extensibility upon
 heating, nor do they become brittle if cooled to below
freezing.

EXPERIMENT NO:-1
AIM:- To compare tensile strength of cotton, silk and
nylon fibers.
Apparatus Requirements:- Cotton, wool, silk, polyester,
hook, weight hanger, weights.
Procedure:- 1. Take equally cut pieces of cotton, silk and
nylon fibers from given sample of same diameter.
2. Tie one end of the cotton fibers to hook and the other
end to weight hanger.
3. Now start adding weights gradually until breaking
point is reached. Note the minimum weight required to
break the fiber.
4. Repeat this procedure taking silk anf then nylon
thread. Make observations and record them.
Observations:
S. NO. Type of fiber Minimum weight required at breaking of thread
! cotton 8.50
2 silk 3.50
3 wool 9.20
4 polyester 7.00

EXPERIMENT NO:-2
AIM:-To find the effect of acids and alkalis on the tensile
strength of cotton, wool and silk fibers.
Apparatus Requirements:- Cotton, wool, silk, polyester,
hook, weight hanger, weights. Chemical Requirement:-
Hydrochloric acid and sodium hydroxide.
Procedure:- 1. Cut out equal length of cotton, wool and
silk threads from given samples. The threads should be
nearly the same thickness.
2. Determine the tensile strength of each fiber as
explained in experiment 1.
3. Soak a given thread into a dilute solution of sodium
hydroxide for about 5 minutes.
4. Take it out of NaOH solution and wash it thoroughly
with water and dry it in sun or oven at 40°C. 5.
Determine again the tensile strength of woolen thread as
explained in experiment 1
6. Now take another piece of wool thread and soak it in
hydrochloric acid for about 5 minutes. Take it out and
wash thoroughly with water. Dry it and again determine
its tensile strength.
7. Repeat the above procedure for the sample of cotton
and nylon fibers.
S.NO. Type of fiber Tensile strength of fiber
Before soaking After After
soaking in soaking
NaOH in HCl
1 cotton 8.50 8.50 8.20
2 wool 9.20 8.90 9.20
3 silk 3.50 3.00 3.50
4 polyster 7.00 7.00 7.00
 CONCLUSION
Conclusions drew from the experiment are:-
1. Alkali’s decrease the tensile strength of woolen fibers.
2. Acids practically do not affect this fiber.
3. Tensile strength of cotton thread is decreased by acids
and it remains unaffected by alkalis.
4. Nylon fiber is practically unaffected by both acids and
alkalis
BIBLIOGRAPHY:-
 Wikipedia
 Encyclopedia - Britannica Online Encyclopedia
 www.textileschool.com
 www.meritnation.com.
 http://cp.literature.agilent.com/litweb/pdf/
 Index

SL.NO Topic
1 Introduction
2 Types of fiber
3 Objective
4 Scope and
limitation
5 Theory
6 Experiment no. 1
7 Experiment no.2
8 Observation
9 Conclusion
10 Bibliography