Among the fibers obtained from various lignocellulosic agricultural by-products, PALF are the most widely used to develop yarns, fabrics, and other textiles. Yarns and fabrics have been made using 100 % PALF on the cotton, jute, and wool spinning systems. Raw and bleached PALF were processed on standard jute and flax spinning systems [88Gho]. Table 10.5 shows some of the properties of the yarns produced from the PALF. Bleaching resulted in improvement in fineness by about 5 % but resulted in yarns with lower tensile strength. Yarns produced were of 84 tex (7s Ne) and were therefore coarser. The PALF fibers used in this study were probably too coarse to be processed on the cotton spinning system.

PALF with staple length of 20 cm, fineness of 1.5 tex, and tenacity of 26 g/tex were blended with cotton, jute, and wool and processed on various spinning systems. To process the fibers on the jute spinning machinery, about 1 % oil was added and blended with jute in ratios up to 25 % PALF to produce yarns of 66 tex. Chemically treated PALF fibers were blended with cotton and processed on the cotton spinning system. Table 10.6 shows some of the properties of the PALF blended yarns compared to similar count cotton yarns. As seen in the table, PALF blended yarns (14s Ne) have similar properties to that of 14s Ne 100 % cotton yarns except that the PALF blends are more uneven (higher U%). When processed into finer (22s Ne) count, the PALF fibers had lower strength and higher unevenness than the cotton yarns. PALF are much coarser than cotton that leads to more unevenness in the blended yarns. Compared to processing on the cotton system, 100 % PALF yarns were easily produced on a semi-worsted spinning system along with blends with wool in various ratios.

Fibers (25-30 denier) obtained by decorticating pineapple leaves were degummed with sodium hydroxide and later softened using lubricants and used to spin 100 % pineapple leaf yarns on a modified cotton spinning system. Yarns (4s and 6s count) were made by directly feeding the draw frame sliver onto the

ring spinning machine. Tensile properties of the 100 % pineapple fiber yarns were similar to similar count 100 % cotton yarns made using short staple cotton but about 22 % lower compared to 100 % cotton yarns made from medium staple cotton [91Dor].

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