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THE MAN’S JACKET DESIGN FOR DISASSEMBLY: AN IMPLEMENTATION OF C2CAD FRAMEWORK
Impact/Purpose:
mbly, and life cycle material management of this C2CAD man’s jacket; and 3) Revise C2CAD model and prepare instructional unit for apparel design and production students at the university level.
Students from two universities, Oklahoma State Universities and Illinois State University, will collaborate in this project. C2CAD framework and the implementation case study will be integrated into core courses for the Apparel Design and Production major in both universities. To facilitate learning, an educational chart that appeals to visually oriented apparel designers will be developed. The chart will utilize the information gained through this research to enable apparel designers to make intelligent design decisions.
mbly, and life cycle material management of this C2CAD man’s jacket; and 3) Revise C2CAD model and prepare instructional unit for apparel design and production students at the university level.Students from two universities, Oklahoma State Universities and Illinois State University, will collaborate in this project. C2CAD framework and the implementation case study will be integrated into core courses for the Apparel Design and Production major in both universities. To facilitate learning, an educational chart that appeals to visually oriented apparel designers will be developed. The chart will utilize the information gained through this research to enable apparel designers to make intelligent design decisions.
Challenge Area: Many environmental problems related to apparel industry, such as toxicity in dyeing wastewater, could be minimized by apparel designers and manufacturers. Annually, 4.5 million tons of clothing and footwear are produced in the U.S. and only 1.25 million tons of post-consumer textiles are recovered for next use. One of the obstacles for reusing and recycling materials from post-consumer clothing is that most apparel are made from more than one material and constructed with many permanent junctions using stitches and adhesives.
In the 2005/2006 EPA P3 Student Design Competition for Sustainability, we incorporated “cradle to cradle” model into existing apparel design and production models and developed a sustainable apparel design and production model C2CAD using knitwear. In this project we will implement C2CAD model in the design and production of a man’s jacket, a woven apparel product composed of natural and synthetic materials. Design for disassembly will be applied and evaluated in the man’s jacket design and production for material recovery.
Using C2CAD framework, apparel designers and manufacturers select chemicals and materials based on their inherent human and environmental health and safety. Therefore, employee occupational safety and local people’s living quality will be improved. Apparel manufacturers and local communities can save money in pollution prevention and post-production treatment of waste in both the short and long term. The application of design for disassembly concept in apparel design and production ensures maximized material recovery and helps diminish resource consumption in the apparel industry.
We will conduct three phases of research in the 8-month project: 1) Implement C2CAD in man’s jacket design and production and produce a man’s jacket composed of natural and synthetic materials; 2) Evaluate the quality, cost, ease of disasse
Description:
The C2CAD model served as the basis in the man’s jacket design and production. In man’s jackets, both natural and synthetic materials are commonly used for fabrics, threads, and buttons. To promote disassembly and value retention, we minimized material diversity and had two main components, natural outer shell and synthetic lining. The design for disassembly focused on the easy separation of these two main components, while maintaining a wearable product during use.
In men’s jackets, wool fabrics are commonly used as outer shell. After consulting with our collaborator, Dr. Lauren Heine, we found that Pendleton Woolen Mills produces 100% wool fabrics that are certified as “Cradle to Cradle” biological nutrients by McDonough and Braungart Design Chemistry (MBDC). The “Cradle to Cradle” certification warrants the fabric production, including dyes and chemicals used, has passed rigorous testing and evaluation protocol, and has been deemed safe for human and environmental health. After evaluating the Pendleton fabrics, we found these fabrics were suitable for jacket production, and requested 6 colors from Pendleton. In addition to the Pendleton wool fabrics, we also ordered white worsted wool fabric from Testfabrics, Inc., which is suitable for apparel application, for further study. To assess the dyes that can be used on worsted wool fabric, we collaborate with Dr. Tucker Helmes, Executive Director of ETAD North America, and Dr. Lauren Heine to ensure sustainability. Dr. Helmes suggested Lanasol dyes produced by Huntsman International LLC (The Woodlands, Texas). We requested several Lanasol dyes, together with the Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS), from Huntsman. Based on the MSDS assessment, we concluded that two Lanasol dyes, Lanasol Blue and Lanasol Yellow, have the least known adverse effect on human and environmental health. We used these two Lanasol dyes to dye worsted wool fabric from Testfabrics. Only two chemicals, dye and salt (NaCl), were used in the dyeing process.
The mechanical properties and color fastnesses of selected Pendleton and Testfabrics wool fabrics were tested to assure the wool fabrics are suitable for apparel production. The preliminary data analysis show that the textile materials have good mechanical/physical and colorfastness performance and suitable for jacket application. We are currently finalizing data analysis and the results will be reported in the EPA Expo in Washington DC, April 20 to 22, 2008.
According to the “cradle to cradle” model, the recovery method for biological nutrients is returning the nutrients to nature through composting. Since a mixture of natural materials can be biodegraded in the composting process, we used different types of biological nutrients affixed to the outer shell of 100% wool fabric. We used 100% cotton thread, a natural material or biological nutrient, in the sewing of wool fabric outer shell. The buttons affixed on the wool outer shell were natural buttons, Akoya shell and Tagua wood buttons.
For the lining of the jacket, we used 100% satin polyester fabric, a synthetic material or technical nutrient. According to the “Cradle to Cradle” model, the method of recovering technical nutrients is recycling. In order to recover the same quality technical materials after recycling rather than “downcycling” to lower quality materials, it is important to maintain the purity of the material and avoid mixing different types of synthetic materials. Therefore, all the components that are affixed in the lining are 100% polyester. We used 100% polyester thread in the sewing of polyester lining parts.
The students from Oklahoma State University (OSU) and Illinois State University (ISU) designed different patterns for the man’s jacket. Considering the design for disassembly concept, OSU focused on the use of buttons, and ISU students focused on the application of sewing techniques to assemble the outer-shell and lining of the jacket. OSU’s design is a casual outerwear, and ISU’s design is a sport-jacket. The prototype designed and produced by OSU can be found in Figure 1, and the prototypes made by ISU students are in Figure 2.
Figure 1. Man’s jacket prototype developed at OSU
Figure 2. Man’s jacket prototype developed at ISU
We investigated the time and tools needed to disassemble the jacket prototypes. All the prototypes can be easily disassembled within 4 minutes with no tool or using small scissors. The cost estimation of the jacket prototypes are approximately $72 plus design and production labor for OSU prototype, and $85 plus design and production labor for ISU prototype.