Effect of moisture on fabric crease recovery based on a new crease angle measurement platform

A new fabric crease angle recovery measurement platform was developed. It allows the relative humidity (RH) to be controlled and the complete fabric crease recovery process to be evaluated under any pre-set RH level. The characteristics of crease angle recovery of different fabrics were evaluated. It was found that there were obvious differences in the warp and weft crease recovery of fabrics under the same humidity due to the anisotropic fabric structures. It was also found that the higher the RH, the higher the crease recovery. The moisture-driven index (MDI) and slow recovery point (SRP) were established to quantify the characteristics of crease angle recovery of different fabrics and the role of humidity on crease recovery. MDI indicates the sensitivity of crease recovery to humidity, i.e., the recovery magnitude of crease recovery angle with the same RH difference. SRP is the point that the speed of recovery is 0.01°/s. With the increase of RH, the SRP time extends and SRP angle becomes larger. At high RH, SRP time of silk crease is shorter than that of cotton crease, and the SRP recovery angle is also larger, indicating that the recovery degree of silk fabric is better than that of cotton fabric.