Innovative Fabric Technology Or Completely Changing Outdoor Clothing

According to foreign media reports, scientists have recently invented a new way to deal with skiers falling down on the slopes and facing the cold and humid.

It is a lighter, softer and more comfortable new jacket material.

A small company called Voormi in Colorado, USA, is selling a technology that can produce waterproof and breathable materials using monolayer materials.

It may be the first paragraph since 1970s.

Since the advent of the GORE-TEX (Gore Tes) jacket,

The major development.

Voormi's new jacket

Voormi released the latest technology at the snow sports industry association product exhibition in late last month, which supposedly replaced the hard and heavy windbreaker and the traditional hierarchical system supporting clothing with multiple customization features waterproofing, isolation or windproof.

The release of this technology has caused a great stir in the outdoor clothing market of US $1 billion 500 million annually.

"Our point of view is to turn waterproof and breathable into a monolayer fabrication process," said marketing director Tim TimmSmith.

"So this is equivalent to another 1978 revolution. We pressed the restart button."

Let's start with a review of history: in 1969, William Gore (WilliamGore) and Bob Gore (BobGore) invented GORE-TEX by using polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) as the basic material.

When rapidly stretched into a thin film, PTFE can become a thin film whose pores are smaller than those of water droplets but larger than those of water molecules.

Therefore, liquid water, such as rain or snow, can not penetrate this material, but the moisture generated by human body, such as sweating, can penetrate.

GORE-TEX is not the only film that exists in the market. When the patent expired in 1997, a series of clothing companies put forward other alternatives.

Waterproof or windproof membrane is only one of the core of many outdoor clothing, and the latest technology of Voormi will still use them. The only difference is the application of thin film.

Unlike traditional waterproof breathable fabrics, it requires two layers of material - the latest technology of Voormi is a single layer fabric with a film core, which is lighter, more flexible and more versatile.

The membrane itself is very fragile, so the textile company will press the membrane to the outer fabric to create a two layer (2L) fabric, then cut and sewn into the jacket or trousers or sleeping bag.

Most of the time, more layers of padding should be added to improve durability.

This liner is usually polyester warp knitted fabric, which is the material used by women's bra.

All these constitute the functional part of clothing, but because of

The laminating adhesive and the waterproof adhesive tape needed to cover the hole are very cumbersome.

And these layers will affect the permeability of the membrane, thereby reducing its efficacy.

The latest technology of Voormi completely put aside the lamination.

"We are not gluing the film to the cloth, but we put the membrane in the braiding machine and weave it on the membrane, so we get the single layer fabric produced in the core of the process."

Smith explained.

"This is a completely new platform."

Voormi can "adjust" the characteristics of membrane -- the balance energy between water and air permeability.

You may ask, do you want to weave millions of pinholes on the membrane into a filter screen? This is the mysterious part of Voormi's refusing to reveal details.

Smith said the company has found a way to reorganize the membrane after weaving.

Smith also said that Voormi can "adjust" the membrane's characteristics -- the balance between water and air permeability, which is the function of the pore size of the film.

If the fabric they design is for a cold but dry environment, such as Voormi, Colorado, "we may ensure that the membrane maintains 70% of its water repellency," Smith said.

"Adjusting the water and ventilation balance is part of the project."

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The clothes they designed should be dry and more breathable and comfortable than traditional waterproof clothing.

The focus of waterproof and breathable has always been waterproof, which is why many jackets still have zipper vents.

In fact, because the standard of real waterproof (Gore lead) is so high that Voormi does not claim that its clothing is 100% waterproof.

But the company said that as long as it is not rainstorm and flood, their clothing should be dry and more breathable and comfortable than traditional waterproof clothing.

Smith said that Voormi's technology applies to any type of membrane, not only to ensure waterproof, breathable, but also suitable for almost any type of yarn or yarn mixture.

The material Voormi uses is wool blend.

"So you can get the windproof monolayer underwear foundation," explains Smith.

"This is a brand new product category. We can make the middle layer of a single protective layer - for example, a wind proof T-shirt that can be run, and it will not get wet because of sweating."

Voormi's first product DriftHydro is a hybrid type of soft shell.

As a coat, it is exceptionally light and looks more like an insulating middle layer. It is a soft circular wool and the outside is a hard surface with a fleece.

For anyone who is accustomed to traditional lamination and ancient multi-storey technology, this design is really staggering.

Although it sounds very cool, but as for the effectiveness of this kind of clothing is really like publicity, there are still many problems.

Voormi is a small brand located in the town of the park in Colorado. It is not known for skiing and climbing communities outside the town.

DriftHydro is just one of the three garments made by Voormi using their unique core construction technology. Although more products will be launched, the price of this garment has reached US $400.

Voormi all the clothes are made in the United States, and only to the United States, the material is unique to the sheep that produce wool.

This is amazing, but even if you use flexible domestic processing technology, you may not find many such clothes on the store shelves.

But Voormi's goal is not to become a clothing brand magnate.

Smith said that the goal was to award the core construction technology license to other companies, just as W.L.Gore had Core-Tex's license.

From the beginning, Voormi is actually two companies: a clothing manufacturer, and a R & D department called SWNR (starting from the new rules).

Smith pointed out that these two aspects are essential, because the situation is different from that in 1969.

Licensing may not be as simple as Gore was then.

"Any big (clothing) company has no incentive to do this because they can sell a basic layer and an intermediate layer, and a series of things."

Voormi's retail product is actually a catalyst.

SWNR produces innovative products, and Voormi proves that this concept is feasible at both technical and commercial levels.

At present, the company has not signed any major licensing agreements, nor has announced any partners in the snow sports industry association products exhibition.

At present, the core construction technology is only embodied in the clothes made by Voormi, which is feasible at present, because they have bigger plans.

Although the company has only a small number of employees, its employees are a group of textile engineers, chemists and other innovators.

Founder DanEnglish was the general manager of Microsoft's business solutions; DougLumb, executive vice president of development, worked for 43 years in the world's leading fabric brand Polartec, and he participated in a number of innovative inventions, including artificial wool; Dustin's son, Dustin, worked as a mountain tour guide for years in the harsh Alaska wilderness area, and had many years of practical experience.

Even marketing director Smith worked as a chemical engineer in W.L.Gore company for 12 years before joining Voormi.

"This is just the tip of the iceberg that Voormi is developing now. You will see something new in the coming years. In the future, you will understand what Voormi is doing now."