What is Glitter Printing

Glitter Printing

Glitter printing enables the fabric to show glittering granules on the fabric. For this Glitter powder is used.

Glitter Powder is generally PET with size of 1/8" to 1/256". It is cut into square and hexagon shape. It is available in metallic, rainbow, laser and iridescent colors. Generally it comes in 25 kg bag. A typical glitter power substance is heat resistant to 170 degree celcius and is acid and alkaline proof. The picture of the glitter powder is as given below:

To Print, first glitter paste is prepared. Glitter powder is added in the Glitter ink, under stirring slowly to avoid lumb formation. Glitter ink is made of acrylic co-polymer. Then it is screen printed using Bull nose squeegee (You can read an excellent manual on squeegee here.) The mesh size should not be more than 20 T (An excellent premier on mesh size can be read here).

One can get an idea of the prices of the chemicals used for glitter printing here.

Source of Picture: http://www.ampmerch.com


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What is Foil Printing

Foil printing is to print some pattern with the foil on the fabric for shiny effect. There are twos kind of foil printing method. In the first method, the pattern is printed by a foil/transfer adhesive on the fabric, and then pressed with foil paper by hot steel roller. The pressure is generally 5-6 bar on printed portion and at 190 degree Celcius on fusing machine for 8-12 seconds.  

In foil printing, the quality of the adhesive is very important. Generally it is made up of acrylic co-polymer with water as diluent. Cheaper qualities show very poor stretch, loss of softness and smoothness after five washes and look very unlike the original print. The foil should not stick to cured inks under pressure. Normally a matting agent is added to avoid sticking.

In the second method, printing is done on the foil paper first, and then foil is pressed on the fabric with hot steel roller or iron. 

Foil paper is called the stamping foil paper. Actually it is not the paper but the detachable foil film on the plastic base. Generally it is PET film of 15 micron thickness, available in widths of 640 or 1500mm. 

source of image: http://www.newasiajsc.com

You can watch an amazing video on foil printing here:

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Jala(Jaala) and Adai

Jala and Adai Mechanisms are used in Indian Traditional Saris. They are a close substitute for jacquard machine for weaving intricate designs. Both extra warp and extra weft figuring is possible with these mechanisms.

However there is a basic difference between the two. The following points highlight those. They also talk about some of the distinctive features of Kanchipuram Saris


• In Varanasi Sari, Extra warp and extra weft patterning is done by means of a Jaala, in Kaanchipuram it is done with the help of an adai.

• Separate adai have to be prepared for extra warp border designs, crossborder designs and for body butas. Crossborder is used to refer to the extra weft ornamentation done across the width of the sari to mark the end of its length.

•Solid coloured borders with extra warp patterning and solid colored pallu with extra weft pattern form the distinctive feature of the saris from Kanchipuram. The meaning given to the term solid is that both warp and weft are of the same color.  The warp is made of 2 ply 20-2 denier filature silk, weft of 2 ply twisted 2-=2 denier charkha silk, while 3 ply pure gold/metallic yarn/zari is used for extra warp patterning.

•Jaala mechanism leads to more ornamentation that adai mechanism.

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Count and Denier Made Simple

Yarn count, simply said, is a measure of the fineness of a yarn. Thus it gives an estimation of how thick or thin a yarn is. We can also measure the diameter of the yarn and express it in inches etc. However, the yarn is not exactly circular in cross section. Also most yarn are soft and compressible and hence the moment we apply some scale etc, it gets deflated. 

A method, which is popular in cotton yarns, is to measure the length of a particular weight of yarn. Thus the yarn which has more length will be finer than the other yarn which has less length of the same weight. For cotton yarn this particular weight is one pound, and the length is measured in 840 yards. Thus a cotton yarn has one count, if we measure the length of one pound of this yarn, and it comes out to be 840 yards. If it comes out to be 1680 or 2 x 840 yards for one pound of weight, we call it as a yarn with 2s count and so on. Generally thick shirtings are in the range of 30s count, medium weights are in 60s count and finer weights in 80s count. 

For cotton the length is taken as 840 yards and weight as one pound. For Linen, the length is 560 yards. Thus the yarn of a linen is of count 20 if in one pound there is 20 x 560 yards of length. 

Now, in real world, we come across with two yarns twisted together. If we twist two yarns of 40s count, we call  the yarn as that of 2/40s count. If we twist 3 yarns of 60s count, we call it as a yarn of 3/60s count. 

A method which is also popular in silk is to weigh a particular length of the yarn. In this system, the yarn which has less weight of the same length than some other yarn will be finer than the other yarn. Commonly this is called denier. In denier system, the unit of weight is grams and that of length is 9 km. Thus if a silk yarn weighs 24 grams of 9km of length this is said to be of 24 denier. 

The General Relation ship between count and denier is given by the fact that no of deniers is equal to 5315 divided by no of counts thus if cotton is of 30s count then it will be of 5315/30 or 177.66 deniers. 

Simply speaking, more the count, finer is the yarn. More the denier, coarser is the yarn. 

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