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Textile
Newsletter For Our Automotive Industry Clients September
2000
Testfabrics, Inc. takes great pleasure in issuing this first
edition of an informational newsletter specific to our international
automotive clients and customers. We have a long and reputable
history of service to the automotive industry suppliers
and producers and look forward to maintaining that relationship
and to growing with them as a supplier for their testing
material requirements.
In the past ten years, the globalization of the auto industry
and the subsequent decentralization of testing responsibility
from automotive producer to their respective suppliers has
given rise to a number of products and services now available
from our firm. This trend is an ongoing one and we look
forward to being of further service to both current and
future needs.
Background
As many of you may not be aware of our firm’s role
as a manufacturer and supplier of textile testing materials,
we would like to provide you with a short historical summary.
We think it will give you some necessary insight into how
and why we exist as such an integral supplier to so many
different consumer groups.
Simply put, Testfabrics, Inc. provides exactly what the
name says, fabrics for testing.
It was started in direct response to the needs of the customers
of Werner Klaas, a Swiss silk industry technician and sales
professional in the US in the mid 1930’s. His clients
for his employer’s silk fabrics included the textile
dye and chemical producers and their clients, the commercial
textile dyers and printers. These clients also needed other
fabrics not available through his employer or other sources
and Mr. Klaas independently began to service these needs
for small amounts of textile ‘test materials’.
As in any developing economy, other opportunities continued
to present themselves and Mr. Klaas continued to meet them.
In 1940, the colorfastness committee of the recently formed
AATCC, American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists,
whose members he was already servicing individually, approached
him to help solve a problem in producing a specific control
test material for their industry wide colorfastness test
methods. These methods found ready acceptance as the beginnings
of a major effort to supply both export and domestic war
materials had begun to take place in the US textile industry.
Finished products were required to meet stringent specifications
not previously demanded by the consumer world. Colorfastness
quality control became a very major issue and a control
fabric to perform the various tests was necessary. Mr. Klaas
was able to design, produce and deliver ‘multifiber
fabric’, a composite test material with components
of acetate, cotton, nylon, silk, viscose and wool, the primary
commercial fibers of the day. It was the two inch square
piece of fabric that formed the very basic block of a product
line we still produce and distribute world wide. It also
provided Mr. Klaas the start of his independent firm: Testfabrics,
Inc.
Step by step, Testfabrics, Inc. ‘satisfied a need’
‘needs’ directly provided by consumers. Other
special interest textile consumer client groups followed
the lead of the AATCC over the next decades (and still do
today), among them the automotive industry producers who
had to take the colorfastness quality of the upholstery
and other interior components into consideration in their
products.
Over the years, with care and attention paid to customer
needs and requirements, several of the firm’s products
became not only national and domestic industrial standards
for testing but even International Reference Standards for
ISO and other foreign national standards groups (ie: DIN
etc).
Crossover technology from one group of consumers to another
plays a major role in our firm’s history and continued
development. Products and services for one group constantly
lead to similar but often slightly modified products and
services for another. (Several of our newsletters for other
client groups are on our web page, www.testfabrics.com)
The basic concept, ‘satisfy the needs of the consumer
as dictated by the consumer’ is the cornerstone of
what Testfabrics, Inc. is and will continue to be into the
coming years.
Specific Automotive Industry Involvement
The automotive industry is a long time consumer of finished
textile materials for their interior requirements. These
products needed to be colorfast to a variety of consumer
concerns including colorfastness to water and cleaning using
both corporate and industry test methods. Colorfastness
to crocking for which Testfabrics, Inc. provides the consumable
‘crockmeter squares’, 2”x2” cotton
fabric pieces is perhaps the most widely used textile colorfastness
test in the world. Colorfastness to light and weather, atmospheric
contaminants also are major considerations. Often, corporate
methods were modified from existing test methods to fit
the specific needs of the automotive industry. Some of these
methods involved wear testing using Wyzenbeek abrasion and
various pilling equipment for which fabrics were commonly
used to perform the tests. Some specific upholstery soiling
and clean ability methods were employed that required the
use of some of Testfabrics, Inc. ‘soil test cloths’
(taken from the firm’s involvement with the detergent
and surfactant industries). In the late 1980’s, a
need arose for a polystyrene chip for use in monitoring
the performance of the Atlas Weatherometer equipment for
SAE methods. Testfabrics, Inc. was chosen as the manufacturer
and distributor due largely to its reputation as a reliable
supplier of textile test materials. This sparked new interest
among the automotive industry participants as they were
becoming far more global in their reach for both sales and
supplies. Testfabrics, Inc. recognized this tend and moved
to be in line to service the current and future needs as
it has done for so many years.
SAE/IFAI
Transportation Committee Interaction
As with many of our consumer groups, there are professional
associations with committee meetings for the discussion
of common industry problems specific to the participants.
In the case of the automotive industry, the meetings of
the SAE/IFAI Transportation Committee are a focus point
for our firm’s involvement as an interested supplier
serving the needs of all the participants. (One of Mr. Klaas’
often repeated business lessons was, “If you don’t
go, you won’t know.”) It became apparent that
this group required our constant attendance and we have
been fortunate enough to retain the valuable services of
Mr. Fred Lieb, the retired Textile Laboratory Manager for
Chrysler Corp., to attend and participate on our behalf.
With his help, we have been able to maintain necessary contact
and provide help and assistance to our clients more effectively.
International
Cooperation
With the increasing global nature of business marketing
and sourcing, we have been able to take advantage of the
special relationships we have with our sales agents in several
foreign markets, particularly in Japan. The Japanese auto
industry, like their US and other international counterparts
has many specific tests requiring very specific test materials
generally inaccessible to outside buyers because of small
volume requirements and language problems. We have developed
a very good working relationship with our Japanese associates.
We are able to get many specified test materials required
by Japanese automakers with assembly and manufacturing plants
in North America. The same is true for French, German, British
test method materials and equipment. We are ‘test-fabrics’,
worldwide.
Current
Listing of Automotive Test Materials
Our current technical catalog (available on request or on
the internet, www.testfabrics.com) has a section devoted
to materials commonly used in automotive materials testing.
Those products follow for your quick reference: Polystyrene
Reference Plastic Standard Chips for SAE J 1960 & 1885
PVC-White, Unsupported Vinyl 70 cm wide for Ford BN 103
01 #8 and #10 cotton duck fabrics and cotton sateen fabrics
for various abrasion tests Crockmeter Fabric Ford Soil Test
Cloth Chrysler Soil Test Cloth Multifiber Fabrics ISO Fabrics
for testing AATCC, ASTM, Fed. Spec. Fabrics for testing
New
Materials for Automotive Testing
Some of the newer items we have available for automotive
testing follow here for your consideration; news releases
are also on the web page.
Blue Denim for GM Abrasion and Pilling Japanese #6 Cotton
Duck for Nissan abrasion testing Japanese #3 Cotton Lawn
for various Japanese methods AATCC Blue wool light fastness
standards DIN Blue wool light fastness standards for VW
Testing White Vinyl coated Fabric for GM 9141P and related
methods White Leather for GM 9141P Vinyl Coated Fabric for
Chrysler Seam Slippage Tests Crockmeter machines Gakushin
Abrasion Machines (for Japanese automotive testing) Used
test equipment Laboratory accessories including rotary cutting
tools and self sealing protective mats for cutting films,
vinyls, leathers, coated fabrics etc., quality scissors
and specimen marking equipment etc. Prices available on
request for North American customers. Their respective distributors
will service international clients.
Update
on Polystyrene Chips
The round robin for approving lot 5 of the polystyrene chips
is still going on and available stock of lot 4 is quite
low. We hope (and pray) that by the Sept. meeting of the
SAE/IFAI Transportation Committee, some additional data
is available. We have increased the volume of production
of these necessary test materials to accommodate the protracted
testing required for approval of the next lot. Please watch
our website for further updates.
Textile
Services Available
Sourcing and manufacturing: We are experienced textile problem
solvers, please let us know when you are looking for something
you can’t find or assemble. Custom manufacturing,
dyeing, printing, cutting, sewing etc., small volume to
large. Test specimen preparation and distribution: If you
have a specific need to have a number of labs receive specialized
textile test specimens for a round robin or other procedure,
perhaps we can help? Technical service and consulting: We
have many contacts with experienced personnel throughout
the textile industry that may be able to assist you from
test method development, lab set up, training, special projects
etc. Perhaps your group would be interested in having someone
attend industry committee meetings on your behalf? Please
let us know.
We
Need Your Help
Our business can only survive with your help and valuable
input. As we so often explain, we are not the consumers
of our own products and thereby, we do not always know when
there is a problem or a need for something new. We must
rely on our customers to let us know. No matter how small
or insignificant you may think the item is, there is often
a good chance someone else needs the same thing or something
very related. One source always leads to another and our
network of resources grows daily.
What can we do for you?
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