Why Cotton Shrinks

Why Cotton Shrinks

Cotton has the property of swelling in water and this effects shrinking when drying. Also the mechanical stresses, strain and tension, during spinning and weaving etc., when released causes the fabric to shrink.

The cotton fabric, when put in water, swelling occurs and rearrangement of internal forces takes place. The fibres will become free from tensionless state. These are the resons for shrinkage.

In case of a fabric, the warp yarns are under much strain due to interlacement than the weft yarns. The warp yarn shrinkage will be more than weft.

to overcome this, the fabric is extended in widthwise to some extent in the stenter machine during the finishing process. Then it is subjected to preshrink process.