Some Tensile Properties of Specialty Hair Fibers

In 1966, Watson and Martin conducted a study to measure the tensile properties of specialty animal hair fibers due to a lack of comprehensive data in the literature. They tested various fibers including scoured mohair, alpaca fleece, Mongolian cashmere, camel hair, vicuna, and a sample of degreased wool. The fibers were conditioned, measured for denier, and tensile tests were performed on 30 to 40 single fiber specimens of each sample, with recovery measurements on 5 to 10 specimens, both in dry conditions and after wetting. Their findings showed that dry modulus and tenacity values for wool, mohair, and camel hair were consistent with previous measurements by Meredith, while wet tenacities for wool and mohair were higher than those reported by Susich and Zagieboylo. Recovery values for wool, mohair, and camel hair were lower than those reported by other researchers, possibly due to differences in testing methods. Notably, vicuna fibers were found to be extremely brittle, with many breaking during mounting and a significant number showing very low elongations at break. This study provided comparative data for these specialty fibers and highlighted the unique brittleness of vicuna fibers.