Recycling and application of textile waste in different products

Disposing of textiles and agriculture waste is a very big problem. Textile waste covers a wide variety of products including fibres, yarns, and fabrics. It is estimated that around 92 million tons of clothing waste are thrown out every year globally. Most of the portion goes into landfills. This is not only a cause for environmental concern but also represents a waste of useful resources. Reconverting waste clothing material by mixing it with resins can be explored for developing high-quality products like wall and floor tiles. Keeping this in mind, in this study various types of textile wastes like denim, waste fibres from spinning like hemp, polyester, flax, cotton, etc are used to develop wall and floor tiles material having water and flame retardant properties.  Similarly, agriculture waste was also utilized in making various products including tiles, bricks, manhole covers, and drainage cover slabs.  The developed tiles were also tested and compared with the conventional ceramic tiles.

 Need of Protective Work-Wear for Workers of Indian Cement

• November 2021

• Project: 
• Development of Cement Work wear

• Shweta Saxena
• M. S. Parmar
• Sangita Saini
• Vasundhara Verma

Cement demand is closely linked to country's economic development, particularly in the infrastructure and housing businesses. The main growth factors for the cement industry are higher government spending on infrastructure and housing and increasing per capita income. This study aims to review and analyze the current status of cement industry with respect to the risks associated with the health of the workers involved. This study aims to provide guidelines,on how to control and on the areas to be focused by the employer for their better health and safety performance. Not only is it dangerous to work with dry cement, even wet cement can damage the skin because it is caustic, abrasive, and extracts moisture from the skin. India is world's second largest cement producer, and the demand for cement is further increasing due to its various applications.There are no specific protective work wear standards in India for the cement workers. The available work wear is inadequate to protect the workers from the dry or wet cement. Thousands of cement workers work under difficult hot, cold and humid climatic conditions without any protective work wear. This results in multiple health problems at the workplace. The present paper stresses on the need of a safe work wear for cement workers in India.

 Quantification of blend ratio of cotton and hemp blended fabric: A new approach

• M. S. Parmar, 
• Indu Gupta, 
• Shalini Juneja

• February 2022
• Journal of the Textile Association 82/4(Nov-Dec 2021)

Cotton is one of the main members of the cellulose fibre family. With the advent of technology and research, members of the cellulose family are increasing. Some of the examples of recently developed cellulose fibres are hemp, banana, and ramie. These fibres are usually blended with cotton to provide some unique properties. At present, no standard method is available to quantify these fibres in a blend. In the present study, moisture regains properties of fibres were used to quantify the blend ratio of cotton and hemp fibers. Various fibre ratios were used to blend the fibres. The presence of these fibres in the blend was identified using FTIR spectral study. Under various humidity and temperature conditions, the moisture regains of these blends was determined with the standard test method. A calibration curve was plotted between blend percentage of fibres and corresponding moisture regain. Based on the calibration curve, the blend ratio of unknown cotton-hemp blends was determined.

 Dyeing of surface-modified cotton with disperse dye to conserve water: Preliminary study

• February 2022
• Asian Dyer December 2021- January 2022:24-27
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Textile processing is one of the largest and oldest industries worldwide and is responsible for substantial resource consumption and pollution. This paper discussed two approaches (Process-I and Process-II) towards the conservation of water in the wet processing of cotton fabric. In these new approaches, the surface of cotton yarn and fabric was modified using a resin followed by dyeing using disperse dye. In these new approaches, there is no need for pretreatment of the cotton fabric before dyeing which can save a significant amount of water, energy, and other chemicals along with cost benefits. A solid dyeing effect has been achieved on cotton fabric using Process-I. Process-II provided a denim fading look on the cotton fabric.

 Air Cleaner Home Textiles to Reduce Indoor Air Pollution: A Preliminary Study

• November 2020, 
• International Journal of Engineering and Technical Research 9(11):398-401

• Arindam Basu, 
• Girendra Pal Singh, 
• M. S. Parmar

Indoor pollution sources that release gases or particles into the air are the primary cause of indoor air quality problems. Inadequate ventilation can increase indoor pollutant levels by not bringing in enough outdoor air to dilute emissions from in door sources and by not carrying indoor air pollutants out of the area. High temperature and humidity levels can also increase concentrations of some pollutants. In this study cotton fabric is treated with natural mineral (expressed as natural mineral1) and exposed with carbon mono oxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and sulphur dioxide gases individually. After passing through the fabric samples (untreated and treated with mineral), these gases were analysed quantitatively. Study indicated that there was a sharp reduction of these gases after passing through the mineral treated fabric as compared to the untreated fabric.

 Study to analyze and improve anti riot body protector

• February 2021, 
• Man-Made Textiles in India XLIX No. 1(January 2021):7-11

• Neha Kapil, 
• M. S. Parmar, 
• Sangita Saini

Anti riot body protectors are very essential personal protective equipment mostly used by paramilitary and police forces during riots. These body protectors, protect them against various possible threats such as stone-pelting, stabbing, petrol bomb attack etc. during riots. To understand the suitability of present body protector used by soldiers, a study was carried out. The study was divided in to three parts. In the first part of study, a survey was carried out using well designed questionnaire among the 95 soldiers of Rapid Action Forces (RAF). It was revealed from the survey that the soldiers need improved body protectors which can have better stab and impact resistance capability, better durability of hook and loop fasteners. Besides, they pointed out faulty design of body protector which made wearer uncomfortable. Study also pointed out that the design of the body protector was only for male. It was not suitable for female troopers. In the second part of the study, 25 body protectors were procured from the paramilitary forces, police forces and manufacturers to analyze their performance against stab and impact tests. The study revealed that most of the body protectors failed to qualify the requirement given in VPAM KDIW 2004, Edition 2011, standard used for analyzing stab and impact resistance properties of body protector. In the third part of study, composite materials were developed which qualified the requirement of stab resistant as per VPAM KDIW 2004, Edition 2011 standard.

 Analysis of dust resistance property of coated and laminated fabrics using newly developed instrument

• March 2021, 
• Colourage

• M. S. Parmar, 
• Shweta Saxena, 
• Sangita Saini, 
• Durgesh raj Maurya

Workers in the cement industry are engaged in the activities of packing, mixing, transportation and distribution. Being medium risk industry in terms of health hazards, workers are required to have protective work-wear to protect them from anticipating hazards due to the direct exposure of cement dust. Under this study an instrument has been developed to determine cement dust resistance nature of protective fabric. Six types of coated and laminated fabrics were tested on this instrument and their results are compared with air-permeability, hydrostatic head test and moisture vapour transmission properties of these fabrics.