A study of the crease-resistance of viscose rayon

Crease-resistance is a very greatly desirable property in textile fibers. Of the natural fibers, wool exhibits this property to the greatest degree, followed by silk, cotton, and flax, which has a very low crease-resistance. The artificial cellulose fibers fall considerably below wool and silk in this respect.

The improvement of the crease-resistance of rayon and other fibers has been sought in various after-treatment processes, in which substances are either deposited within the fiber, or react with it. There are numerous patents (22) for such methods of imparting crease-resistance. It would be highly desirable if the crease-resisting powers could be achieved "by a modification of the intrinsic properties of a fiber, that is, by producing a fiber which already is crease-resistant.

The purpose of the work reported here was to attempt to produce a viscose rayon fiber with better crease-resisting properties, and to study the effect of a variation in the cellulose chain length distribution in the rayon upon this property.

This work was done under a Fellowship of the Behr-Manning Corporation, Troy, New York.