Abstract:

There are several standard test methods (based on different construction mechanisms) and the respective experimental conditions (relative humidity, air velocity, test temperature) which lead to essentially different estimates of water vapour permeability as well as the effective transport coefficients for the same textile materials. To develop objective comparative methodology within a set of similar materials, one needs either to eliminate completely the effect of both factors above or to take into consideration their combined influence on the textile transport characteristics in a self-consistent manner. The latter, a more promising strategy of comparison, requires, first of all, a correct definition of properties related just to the textile materials, but not to the specific test-methods or to their experimental conditions and peculiarities. This work is an attempt to create a physically-plausible alternate model of hydrophilic (l) and/or hydrophobic (b) textile materials by the special concept of effective porosity dependent on the moisture content and, as a result, on the bulk density of fabric. We consider the permeability in the generalized Darcy’s-Fick’s law as the function of effective porosity, which controls all main transport coefficients of textile material. Any adjustable coefficients are absent in the alternate basic l/b-model proposed.