Increasing Pile Density in Electrostatic Flocking by Introducing a Guiding Electrode

The physical performance of flocked fabrics increases greatly as the number of fibers flocked per unit area increases. With current electrostatic flocking techniques, the greatest pile density that has been achieved contains only about 23 percent of the maximum theoretically possible in a random impingement process. By inserting a third electrode, the strength of the electric field in the lower part of the flocking zone can be increased without causing a corona discharge. As a result the added electrode directs the fibers more effectively onto the substrate so as to increase the flocking density. In the experiments reported here, the flock density was increased by an average of 18.6 percent, ranging from 7.1 percent to 38 percent.