Hey everybody, welcome back to Explain Malcolm 5, a podcast where we take the questions you always want to ask and talk about them in a way that's easy to understand. We are your hosts, I'm Tim. Hey everyone, I'm Kevin. So Kevin, today we're talking about something we use every day, and that is cotton.
So let's start with this question. Why are cloves that are hung out to dry often crunchier and stiffer than cloves that are dried in a dryer? Well, that's a really interesting question, and the answer is because the heat and the tumbling action that happens inside dryers, it helps relax all those fibers in the clothes, so that they feel softer. And unless there's like a breeze, when you're hanging clothes, they remain pretty stationary, so the fiber is dry in that locked, you know, stiffer state.
This is also why a steam iron needs to be hot to help the steam basically penetrate and loosen the fibers within the wrinkles. And there's also the use of starch or other additives that can change the stiffness, of course. And interestingly, too much detergent without enough rinsing and hard water can also cause cloves to be, you know, that kind of crunchy and stiffer state. So why don't we back up and talk about how we get to cotton in the first place?
Sure, sure. Basically, what is cotton, right? Exactly. So cotton is a natural and very soft fiber that grows with the seeds of the cotton plant.
In its natural form, it actually grows in a ball, and the fiber is kind of long and thin, like hair. After the cotton fiber is gathered from the plant, it can then be spun into something called cotton thread. Now that cotton thread is then made into cloth. It's actually one of the oldest fibers around.
There are traces of cotton from like over 7,000 years ago, recovered from archaeological sites. It's really its versatility that makes it one of the most popular natural fibers in existence today. Well, and one of the things that's versatile about it is it's often combined with other types of materials. So how does a small amount of, say, spandex woven into a non-stretchable cotton fabric make the entire garment stretchy?
Also a really good question. The answer is it's not really that the spandex is allowing the cotton to become stretchy. It's that the spandex helps in retaining the tight and original shape of the garment, actually. So, you know, most people don't think of it this way, but you could easily stretch most knit cotton clothing.
The problem is that it has something called limited elasticity. So it will mostly kind of stay stretched after you stretch it. It's the elastic spandex that mixed in causes the fabric to be able to return to its original shape. Okay.
And when we mix two materials like cotton and, say, lycra, and, say, it's blended, how do they blend these materials? Is it during the stitching process or some other process? So they basically blend the materials during the thread-making process, not during the shirt-making process. Basically, a thread is spun with a mix of fibers, and that thread is used to make fabric, and then that fabric is cut and sewn into a shirt, for example.
And, you know, actually different parts of the shirt, like maybe the collars or the sleeves, may actually use different fabric made of different blends, too. Generally speaking, those percentages are calculated by weight. Okay. So talk about the different stages where the mix or the blending can take place.
Yeah. So one place is actually at the start, at the stage of yarn spinning. Basically, these elastomeric yarns, like lycra, are continuous filament products. And there's a process called core spinning, where the elastic is put basically right into the middle of the yarn, and then covered by the cotton or polyester, or whatever fiber touches the skin.
And that's also why you don't really see or feel those yarns in the garments. But if you isolate one and untwist it, you'll actually find a white stretchy filament in the middle. How about with polyester? That's an interesting one that's combined with cotton quite often.
Yes, it's pretty common. And if you're specifically talking about that 50-50 cotton-polyester blend, so these are typically mixed by weight prior to yarn creation while they're still fibers. Basically, if the product is made with short staple yarn, that way you get a really homogenous blend for both properties, and also a dye consistency. Dyes that work on cotton don't work with polyester because chemically, they're older opposites.
Now, what makes some clothing material, say like wool, warm when they're wet, but others like cotton, in fact, sometimes the opposite feels cold when wet. Oh, yeah, it is a pretty funny feeling. Well, in the case of wool and cotton, it is actually up to the individual strands that makes a difference. So, for example, wool is rather non-porous, and it ends up coating itself with a lot of natural oils from your skin, or if it's raw, from your sheep's.
And what happens is these oils help repel water. So it's a very curly, creaky material, and this creates many pockets of air that warm up and can act as insulation. While, on the other hand, cotton is a very porous plant fiber. Its fibers are pretty straight, too.
So it absorbs the oils and waters into its internal structure, and that straightness of the fiber helps create a smoother fabric, so it feels good against the skin rather than, you know, poking into it and making it feel itchy, that wool feels like sometimes. And this is also why it is less effective at creating air pockets for insulation. Got it. Now, can you please explain why bedsheets have these thread counts?
What are those? Oh, yeah, yeah. So there's two components to bedsheets, fabric type, and then something that's often counted in those marketing pages called thread count. And 100% cotton sheets and cotton blends are probably the most common types of sheets.
The different types of cotton plant used will mean cotton fibers can vary widely in length, actually. The longer the cotton fiber, generally the softer and more durable fabric. And that's why you get labels like Egyptian cotton or Pima cotton. They're valued higher because they have much longer fibers versus a standard cotton, which uses some shorter fibers.
Okay, but how about the thread count number? Oh, yeah. So the thread count is the number of parallel threads in a square inch of fabric. And a higher thread count, like 1,000, is considered more durable and softer.
Why is that? Well, think about something like the wicker chair, right? If the wicker is woven really wide apart, when you sit on it, you'll sink in between the wicker that will woven together. While on the other hand, the closer together wicker is, the less space to sink into and thus more comfortable the chair will be.
So this is the same for thread count, but on a much more smaller scale. The individual threads will undergo less stress because they are closer together, and it will feel smoother because there's not as much space in between the threads. Did you like something new? If you did, send us an email.
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