Fabric Wetting and Wicking Measurement Based on Dynamic Image Acquisition and Processing

After a brief review of existing methods for fabric wetting and wicking measurement,a new numerical approach based on dynamic image acquisition and analysis was proposed to study the liquid wetting and wicking properties of woven fabrics.A measuring system was first developed to record on-site the images of liquid ascending in fabrics for a certain period of time.The hardware and software platforms and the experimental methods were described,and the image processing and analysis as well as other related algorithms were discussed in detail.The liquid front curves and rising rates in wetting and wicking were eventually obtained towards different fabrics.From liquid wicking curves,relationship between liquid ascending height and liquid ascending time agrees well with the Washburn theory.The data comparison between the numerical measurement and the traditional test proves the reliability of the numerical results.