Tech Fabric Care

[barto]

Acquired some Grangers and Nikwax - getting ready to wash my j1a-gt for the first time. going to follow these procedures (plus remove jacket sling & loosen draw cords on hem and hood) :

 

 

Any other sage advice? Should items be washed separately? What fabrics can be machine vs hand washed. Dryer vs. hang dry? Grangers for everything? Nikwax on only GT? Best practices to reduce the amount of fading?

 

EDIT: thanks @CARLOOA for the following:

 

How do I wash this stuff?

As a general best practice with performance technical fabrics:

1.    Run the clean cycle on your empty washer.

2.    Double rinse your washer if it’s old. Fabric softener and harsher chemicals can negatively affect material performance.

3.    Use technical fabric wash if possible, otherwise use a water based detergent.

4.    Zip up jacket and turn inside out to prevent buttons getting fucked and run not on hot.

5.    Double rinse.

6.    Hang dry.

7a.    If you’re experiencing wetting out (when the water doesn’t bead), you may need to reactivate or redistribute DWR, keep inside out and tumble dry low heat or iron on low.

7b.    If you’re experiencing wetting out still, you may need to reapply the DWR. if using spray, remove from washer, apply liberally, tumble dry if needed (some sprays don’t require heat to reactivate). If you used 2 in 1, tumble dry if needed.

What I do—YMMV:

Sell before you wash it, duh. Just kidding:

For jackets: single wash cold, double rinse.

For S/CH: single wash gentle cycle, no spin—don’t really want premature abrasion though generally these fabrics are pretty hardy. Manufacturer says proprietary coatings. DWR reapplication should be fine. I use a steamer to get the wrinkles out after air drying.

For DS: single wash cold, double rinse. Manufacturer says proprietary coatings. DWR reapplication should be fine.

For GT/WS/S: Everything is DWR'd, this is a coating on the face fabric that allows the water to bead out. With abrasion this comes off, to reactivate wash, reapply, and depending on what DWR, tumble dry or iron. I use Grangers.

For PB: since no outer fabric and no DWR is used no tumble drying or DWR is needed.

Edited November 29, 2017 by barto

[CB200]

Wash like with like. Don't mix synthetics and natural fibres. Wash inside out do up zippers. Avoid putting too coarse things with softer fabrics, a heavier denim will work as an abrasive in a machine. I've been told from a fabric supplier that Nikwax doesn't rinse out as well as Grainers. Use a clean washing machine or dryer, fabric softeners will kill DWR, if you use a shared washing machine or dryer you've got no idea if a product with a softener has been in there. If there's a membrane make sure it's rinsed out well. Hang to dry.  If heat is needed to activate the DWR do it after the piece is dry for shorter time. You can hand wash anything, but ensure you rinse really well. 

[tv_ice]

For those dealing with wear on epic or stotz garments, I would suggest tenacious tape by gear aid. My J46s was starting to develop some holes, and I am really pleased with the patching I did with the tenacious tape. The black fabric tape has a nice matte finish that blends really well with the stotz. Seems pretty sturdy too.

Edited November 26, 2017 by tv_ice

[brainerd666]

1 hour ago, tv_ice said:

For those dealing with wear on epic or stotz garments, I would suggest tenacious tape by gear aid. My J46s was starting to develop some holes, and I am really pleased with the patching I did with the tenacious tape. The black fabric tape has a nice matte finish that blends really well with the stotz. Seems pretty sturdy too.

Thanks for the heads up. I was planning on making a thread regarding this very issue. My P10-CH’s have developed very small wear holes near the front pockets and I was going to look for solutions to keeping them from turning into much larger holes. 

[Method]

Looking to wash my veilance align jacket and apply dwr. 

Sounds like I should go with grangers over nikwax? Is the the two-in-one granger recommended? Would be nice to only have one bottle vs two. 

[CARLOOA]

On 11/25/2017 at 8:43 AM, CB200 said:

Wash like with like. Don't mix synthetics and natural fibres. Wash inside out do up zippers. Avoid putting too coarse things with softer fabrics, a heavier denim will work as an abrasive in a machine. I've been told from a fabric supplier that Nikwax doesn't rinse out as well as Grainers. Use a clean washing machine or dryer, fabric softeners will kill DWR, if you use a shared washing machine or dryer you've got no idea if a product with a softener has been in there. If there's a membrane make sure it's rinsed out well. Hang to dry.  If heat is needed to activate the DWR do it after the piece is dry for shorter time. You can hand wash anything, but ensure you rinse really well. 

Yeah, adding to this, if you have a clean cycle do that before washing your overly expensive tech garments.

6 minutes ago, Method said:

Looking to wash my veilance align jacket and apply dwr. 

Sounds like I should go with grangers over nikwax? Is the the two-in-one granger recommended? Would be nice to only have one bottle vs two. 

2 in 1 is fine.

[X.bee]

There's a lot of information we've shared on the main thread, though it'd be nice to have it all compiled here with a sticky.

While I'm here, does anyone have experience washing dryskin fabrics?

[Xu Jianfeng]

18 minutes ago, X.bee said:

There's a lot of information we've shared on the main thread, though it'd be nice to have it all compiled here with a sticky.

While I'm here, does anyone have experience washing dryskin fabrics?

I just cold water hand wash, with no soap and natural hang dry.

[GUNDAM]

DS & Stotz pants i just throw in a 40 wash w grangers, pretty sure on the label it says 30 for DS but i like to live life on the edge. 

[barto]

anyone tried ironing Stotz to reactivate DWR as stated on the label?

[X.bee]

Would this steaming method to pull out wrinkles apply to all fabrics?

 

Edited November 28, 2017 by X.bee

[RemarkableArmor]

5 hours ago, barto said:

anyone tried ironing Stotz to reactivate DWR as stated on the label?

Yes - several times. It works fine in my experience. 

In case anyone is interested, I queried the 'reimpregnate after 5 washes' on the ACR EtaProof pants with Stotz a while back, as to me that sounded less like a surface DWR and more like something was required to be put back inside the fabric. I got the following back:

Quote

you certainly can use NikWax cotton spray for reimpregnation. In fact, only the outer layer is important to be water repellent.

 

 

[dixonschneider]

Has anyone got experience in cleaning stone island tank shield jackets? To be exact, mine is the coat from FW16. I mean, I guess it should probably be quite similar to cleaning a gore-tex jacket but the tag inside just says handwash. The thing got worn often and needs a clean, plus the DWR wore off so I need to do smth. 

// EDIT: Washed my Tank Shield Jacket with the Grangers 2 in 1 recently. 30°C, low rpm. As i haven't got a tumble drier, i used a hairdryer. Came out fine, membrane is intact and the impregnation is like on day one. Note that Stone Island officially recommends hand wash and not using a tumble dryer at all.

Edited May 27, 2019 by dixonschneider

[FelixRevolt]

Debut Post

 

Hello everyone, to cut a long story short I own a Stone Island Lasered Reflex Mat jacket and through my own fault of storing it in my wardrobe the material has stuck together in various places on the jacket. Is there anyone who has experienced this issue and is there a way to repair/salvage the jacket? Grazie.