Stainless Steel Fibre With Wool

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31548, 9 December 1967, Page 8

Stainless Steel Fibre With Wool

Shock-free wool carpeting is coining into use in the United

States, according to Dr D. A. Ross, who is in charge of work on crossbred wool products at the Wool Re-

search Organisation at Lincoln. In these carpets a very small proportion—about 0.3 per cent—of very fine fibre made out of stainless steel is combined with the wool. Dr Ross said the purpose of incorporating the stainless steel fibre in wool was to prevent the shock received from static electricity when people walked on carpets, including wool carpets, under conditions of low humidity. In the United States, Dr Ross said, carpets were being

increasingly used in schools and in hospitals. In hospitals the use of the shock-free carpeting was being

urged to obviate the risk of a flash fire from a spark from static electricity where oxygen was used. Dr Ross said he believed that the first trials with this type of carpeting had been

done at Lowell Technical College, one of the Massachusetts State universities, when he was there about four years ago. He does not think that this form of carpeting will have much application in New Zealand for the reason that use of central heating was not so widespread and the same low humidity conditions were not experienced here. Dr Ross said that the stainless steel fibre cost 44 American dollars per lb, but such a small percentage was necessary in a wool carpet that it had almost no effect on carpet prices.