Repellan®: Protection against water and soil
Repellan® envelops the fabric like an invisible film and makes it harder for greasy and wet substances to penetrate. All sorts of soil can be removed easily through a protective treatment the naked eye cannot detect. Repellan® even offers lasting protection against water too – while the treatment survives many washes.
Repellan® makes it harder for soil and liquids to penetrate the textile, making it easy to get rid of. Irrespective of whether it contains water, coffee, tea, wine, oil, butter, or pasta sauce. In fact, in many cases it can just be sponged off. Removing stains through machine washing is also demonstrably easier with Repellan®, and cleaning is proven to be more successful – because clothing can be washed at lower temperatures, shorter cycle times or without abrasive cleaning products. By that, it retains its color and feel for longer. Repellan® can also be used to protect clothing used in industrial environments.
Repellan® also provides long lasting protection against moisture for textiles. Rain cannot penetrate fabrics treated with Repellan®. Instead, moisture remains in droplet form on the fabric and can simply be wiped away or left to run off. In addition, it is proven that Repellan® treated clothes retain their original appearance better than untreated textiles. The Repellan® film is also breathable – providing the underlying fabric is too. Moreover, Repellan® survives many washes and dry cleaning and makes clothing look like new for longer.
A protective shield against water and stains
Repellan® works with all popular textile materials. The protective film is invisible to the naked eye and does not have any effect on the appearance or the feel of a fabric. Repellan® is also breathable, so when breathable fabrics are treated with Repellan® they keep their characteristics – and additionally gain resistance to wear and tear, proven in comparison with other materials under stress and tension testing.
The decisive factor for first class water and stain protection in clothing is the law of surface tension. The lower the surface tension, the harder it is for a material to absorb moisture. In other words, liquids must have a markedly lower surface tension than the material into which they wish to penetrate if they are to do so – otherwise liquids will just bead up as droplets. Repellan® has an exceptionally low surface tension and as a result, is particularly well suited to protecting textiles against moisture and staining.
The application of Repellan® is easily integrated into existing finishing processes. That means you can use standard industry machines to create the protective film. There are other advantages: Repellan® is compatible with selected softeners and coating technologies, has a neutral odor, and also an exceptionally fast fixing and curing time. Each Repellan® product has specific characteristics that can be tailored to the individual requirements of the customer – enabling efficient solutions for business, leisure, sports and industrial clothing.
Is a piece of clothing water-repellent, watertight, or waterproof? This is a question answered by a modified DIN EN 343 standard. It describes a test process for determining the water resistance of clothing and values for the maximum permitted levels of water vapor penetration. The standard determines the water resistance value of a fabric by measuring the height of the tallest water column that can be placed in contact with the fabric without it becoming waterlogged. All Repellan® products achieve a DIN EN 343 rating which, depending on the material, corresponds to being water repellent or waterproof.
The Repellan product portfolio
Pulcra Chemicals has developed a broad portfolio of Repellan® products, covering water protection, stain protection, and combined protection. In fact, each Repellan® product has specific characteristics that can be tailored to the individual requirements of the customer – enabling efficient solutions for business, leisure, sports, and industrial clothing.