Kapok fiber has poor spinnability, so it is generally difficult to spin pure. By blending with cotton, viscose or other cellulose fibers, clothing fabrics with good luster and feel can be woven. For example, Daiwa Textile Company of Japan put kapok and cotton blended fabrics on the market in 2003, with kapok content of 30% ~ 50%. There are three kinds of blended yarns: 73 tex, 58.3 tex and 29 tex. The company also developed a blended fabric with polyester filament and nylon filament as warp yarns and kapok and cotton blended yarns as weft yarns. These cotton fabrics are mainly used to make women's light jackets, shirts and dresses and men's tops. At present, Shanghai Pan Ming Enterprise Development Co., Ltd. uses its own patented technology to spin 18.2 ~ 27.8 tex kapok blended yarn. The kapok fiber content can reach 70%, which can make kapok fiber widely used in knitting underwear, sweaters, woven leisure coats, bedding, hosiery machines and other fields.
2. Filling materials for middle and high-grade bedding floc, pillow core and cushion.
In the past, kapok fiber was not widely used in these fields, because kapok fiber was too thin, with low bending stiffness and poor compression elasticity, and the filler was easily crushed and bonded. With the passage of time, the softness, comfort and warmth of the product decrease rapidly, the strength of the quilt is low, and holes will appear in some areas (the quilt is partially caught).
Recently, Donghua University has developed the "Manufacturing Technology of Long-term Soft and Warm Wood-cotton Sheets". The strength, compressive elasticity and thermal durability of wood wool flocs manufactured by this technology are equivalent to those of the current seven-hole and eight-hole polyester flocs, but they have incomparable advantages in softness, hygroscopicity and environmental protection, and the manufacturing cost is not higher than that of polyester flocs.
3. Tourism and entertainment products
Kapok fiber is the best buoyancy material, and the bedding made of it is light and easy to carry. Visitors can lie on kapok mattresses and sunbathe by the sea and lake. Because kapok fiber doesn't absorb water, it can be used to sleep at night after being slightly dried on kapok mattress. As a buoyancy material for life jackets, compared with life jackets filled with foamed plastics such as PVC and PE, it is not easy to age and break.
4. Thermal insulation and sound absorption materials
Kapok fiber can be used as a filler for thermal insulation layer and sound absorption layer of buildings. 1998, the kapok-wool composite thermal insulation building material was developed by Dresden University of Technology, Germany, which proved that it has better heat absorption and thermal insulation performance than the wool fiber insulation material alone. As a kind of natural cellulose fiber, kapok fiber has a unique structure with thin wall and large hollow, and its porosity is much higher than other existing fibers. It is an excellent heat insulation, sound insulation, warmth retention and buoyancy material. Its luster, hygroscopicity and warmth retention are natural materials used as clothing fabrics. Although the yarn strength will decrease after being mixed with kapok, it can not only reduce the cost, but also improve the environmental protection and hygiene performance of the product, which provides a new product for meeting the international "special protection" barrier. At present, the blended content and spinnability of kapok fiber are low, so further research on spinning technology and equipment is needed.