A study on coarse Hanji yarn manufacturing and properties of the Hanji fabric

Hanji (Korean traditional paper) yarn displays excellent humidity control, air permeability, and absorbency as well as pleasantness to the touch due to its structural characteristics, and thus, it has been developed as a new eco-friendly fibrous materials. In this study, Hanji, having a basis weight of 8 and 10 g/m², was prepared using mulberry fibers. The prepared Hanji was cut into Hanji tape of 5–10 mm in width using a rotary slitter and then the tape was twisted to manufacture Hanji yarn. To ensure a uniform twist of Hanji yarn and a smooth twisting process, a water supply system was designed to provide water directly at the twisting zone. At a fixed spindle speed, the feeding speed of the delivery roller was varied to provide different twist numbers for the Hanji yarn. The Hanji yarn manufactured with water treatment has higher tensile properties and a softer touch than the Hanji yarn prepared without water treatment. The Hanji yarns have count numbers of 7–11 Ne and tensile strengths of 1.0–1.2 gf/d. Moreover, the fabric from Hanji yarn shows an excellent color fastness of 4.0 grade, staining of 4–5 to washing, and 4–5 grade to dry cleaning.