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Size isn’t everything


Christeyns discusses the issue with fibre size that has become more of a problem for commercial laundries in their endeavours to meet supply for the hospitality sector.


Like many industries, the laundry sector has been affected severely in many ways over the past year due to COVID-19 and the changes this has brought to our daily lives. It has led to a pretty erratic pattern of operation for most launderers, with peaks and troughs causing all kinds of issues, not least in staffing, linen provision and new hygiene regimes.


To meet the demand highs, many commercial launderers have purchased large quantities of linen to ensure that customers have the supply they need when they need it. However, this has brought with it additional work in ensuring the linen products are fully ready for use in the supply chain.


New linen can still contain ‘size’ – a coating applied to warp yarns prior to weaving to provide protection and boost fibre properties and adhesion in composites. Size material forms a stiff and smooth coating on warp threads to enable them to resist the cyclic tensions during the weaving process in the loom and reduce fibre breakage.


The sizing agents are macromolecular, film-forming and fibre-bonding substances, which can be divided into two main types: natural sizing agents, which include native and degraded starch and starch derivatives, cellulose derivatives and protein sizes; and synthetic sizes, which include polyvinyl alcohols, polyacrylates and styrene- maleic acid copolymers. Starch-based sizing agents are most commonly used for cotton yarns because they are economical and provide satisfactory weaving performance.


Part of the linen fabrication process does include a desizing procedure to remove the size from the warp yarns of the woven fabrics as it can act as a barrier to dyes and chemicals, causing issues down the supply


48 | LEISURE AND HOSPITALITY


line. Unfortunately, uneven or incomplete desizing does occur, leaving laundries with linen that involves specialist treatment before it can be used.


Hygiene specialist Christeyns, and its gentle care division Cole & Wilson, are finding that many of their customers are looking for support in tackling this problem with the team currently involved in size removal work at many customer sites.


Dave Benson, Business Development Director at Christeyns, stated: “Textiles are arriving onto laundry sites not correctly desized, with no data on type of size or process required to remove it. Laundries then have to fully remove size before the linen can be used. If this does not occur, the linen won’t pass through the ironer properly and it can be very difficult to remove any subsequent staining of the linen, say from food or shampoos, as the film prevents optimum action from the wash chemicals.”


Due to the stop start nature of the hospitality industry this past year, laundries have had to deal with the problem of size in much larger quantities and on a more regular basis. This brings with it several issues.


Poorly presented textiles – which once washed can make further size removal more difficult – lead to wasted production hours and wasted management effort trying to manage and resolve the issue. From a laundry perspective, the addition of multiple processes required to achieve a satisfactory finish mean increased costs in terms of water, energy, chemicals and time. This leads to reduced production efficiency, longer process times, and extended running hours for the plant.


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