R&D continuously driving growth of nonwovens sector

The nonwovens sector is extremely well-integrated, and in addition to the activities of the manufacturers themselves, strong research alliances have been forged with suppliers and customers, resulting in an almost uniquely-integrated chain.

Much development work, however – especially as far as the essential synthetic fibre raw materials are concerned – was historically driven by such giant chemical corporations as Akzo-Nobel in the Netherlands, Hoechst AG in Germany, ICI and Courtaulds in the UK and Rhône-Poulenc in France.

But one of the most successful of all companies in developing new synthetic fibres was DuPont. In one remarkable month, April 1930, the DuPont scientist Dr Wallace Hume Carothers and his team discovered both neoprene synthetic rubber and synthesized the first polyester. Perhaps surprisingly, at the time DuPont opted to ignore polyester, although the fibre it chose to commercialise instead – polyamide, or nylon – certainly made enough of an impact. During his nine years with DuPont, Carothers filed for more than 50 critical patents, which would secure his company’s future for many years to come.

 Vileda

The development of the very first nonwovens at Freudenberg in Germany was also the result of a chance discovery in the laboratory.

Back in 1849, Freudenberg was originally founded as a tannery and became one of the biggest leather manufacturers in Europe after developing a tanning process using chrome liquor instead of vegetable dyes.

But the period from the First World War to the economic crisis of 1929 hit the company hard, and it was obliged to look for other products and markets.

Freudenberg researchers started re-working leather residues and then developing substitute materials for leather – notably with synthetic rubber as the base material. But variants of this base material – employing the newly-available synthetic fibres – were soon recognised as materials with many other uses.

By 1948 Freudenberg had introduced its nonwoven interlinings under the brand Vlieseline and its Vileda household products, with Viledon filter materials following a decade later – all of which remain highly-successful brands today.

Meltblown

Meltblown nonwovens, meanwhile, were first produced in the early 1950s by the USA’s Naval Research Laboratories, which believed that the materials might have the ability to collect radioactive particles in the upper atmosphere – in order to monitor the worldwide testing of nuclear weapons.

This project was subsequently abandoned, but re-discovered almost 20 years later by researchers at Exxon, who were exploring uses for the company’s newly-commercialised polyolefin (known as polypropylene today), the key raw material for a considerable percentage of spunmelt nonwovens.