Bandage Webs
There is quite a large demand for surgical and bandage webs, Fig. 3, in widths ranging from 2 to 4 inches. These webs are used for binding the limbs and other purposes and are in the pure white or natural yarns. They require to be made with a long soft easy stretch. An open reed of about 12 dents per inch is employed. Four threads are generally used for the binder, weaving two up and two down. The goods are similar in construction to a regular lisle web, except that the gut is omitted in order to get the easiest possible movement.
Fig. 3.—Bandage Webs; Fabric at Left Made with Plain Rubber; Web at Right Made With Covered Rubber
The yarn is generally the same quality and size for both warp and filling, and is usually a soft spun 2-20s. The side of rubber is generally about 38 or 40, with 40 picks per inch and a finished stretch of 100 per cent. The use such webs are put to, necessitating as we have already said a soft and sluggish stretch, prevents the use of a heavy rubber thread, the result being that when the bandage is kept in close contact with the warm body, the life of the fine rubber is of short duration.
This condition, and the open weave necessary to get the easy stretch, have made it expedient to use in many of these goods strands of rubber which have been covered with cotton threads before weaving. This process not only prolongs the life of the web, but allows for even more open weaving, the use of different weaves than would be possible where the uncovered rubber thread is used, and the production of a fabric more suitable for the purpose.
In order to get the soft easy stretch which is the most desirable characteristic of a bandage web, and yet have the necessary width, it is not unusual to introduce a seersucker effect, as shown in Fig. 4, in sections of the web so as to reduce the strong elasticity of the whole. In an ordinary cotton cloth the seersucker or crinkle effect is usually produced by the use of a separate warp of heavier yarn than the rest of the fabric, which warp must be weighted differently and often a different weave is employed to emphasize the contrast in the puckered seersucker effect.
In the elastic web all this special preparation is unnecessary. Wherever the seersucker stripe is desired, strands of rubber are left out which of course takes away from these portions that element which contracts the other part of the web, and a seersucker effect is the result. Such stripes are often used for the ornamentation of some webs by having narrow sections introduced for border effects, or running down the center, and in fact they may be employed in a variety of ways, inasmuch as they lend themselves effectively to different forms of coloring, in relief to the main fabric.