Gearblog - Fabric Lab Testing

When we popped up to see Berghaus for a sneak look at their autumn/winter 2009 range - full report shortly - we also had a guided tour of their in-house testing lab and an interesting insight into just how outdoor clothing is specced and developed that we thought you might find interesting.

The reason behind the lab tour is that Berghaus has rebranded its in-house Aquafoil fabric as 'AQ' for next winter and they wanted to explain just how it works, which we'll come to in a minute, but more generally interesting is the way a large outdoor company like Berghaus makes sure that the fabrics it uses are up to scratch.


It works like this: the designer comes up with a fabric brief, say, 'we making a lightweight alpine shell jacket and need a fabric that's highly breathable, very light, but tough and smells of menthol'. Okay, we made the last bit up, but you get the idea.

Next the fabric technologist finds some likely candidates. Probably a 'safe option' and something slight more adventurous. Once the lab gets sample fabric, testing begins. Rigs assess abrasion resistance, breathability, waterproofness - hydrostatic head - flex resistance, colour fastness, tear strength and more.

What's really interesting and shows the thoroughness of the process, is that the sample fabric is then washed five times in normal detergent and the tests are repeated to make sure there's no deterioration.


Only once the lab tests have been finished with positive results are test garments made up - in Berghaus's own workshop - and sent out for field testing with the legendary Ken Ledward in the Lakes.

Ken hammers his local fells for hours every day in all conditions putting serious miles on outdoor kit then reporting back on any issues. It's his job to determine whether fabrics that do well in the lab tests live up to real life use and that means 200 hours of real hill time on any test garment.

Only if both the lab and Ken agree does the finished garment see the light of day with the result, Berghaus hopes, that there are no nasty surprises in store for their customers. To be honest, it was a real eye opener to see just how much testing and development goes on behind the scenes, the only simiar set-ups we've seen are at Gore's bases in Scotland and Germany and at the Lowe Alpine pack development team HQ in Kendal.

Here Comes AQ

The other eye opener was a rapid insight into how PU membranes work. If you're not a gear geek, you might want to switch off now, go click on the forum or something, but if you are, here's a very brief run through.


If you always assumed that PU membranes are created equal and are just a homogenous smear of PU then you're wrong. The stuff's engineered at a microscopic level to give the right characteristics for its function. So for example, a PU layer might be designed to be tacky on the side that has to stick to the face fabric for maximum adhesion, have a more porous structure for optimum moisture transfer in the centre then use an abrasion resistant top coat for, erm, abrasion resistance.


That's all very simplified stuff, but the images of PU at a microscopic level - looks like those close-ups of dust mites - are fascinating and underline just how much technology goes into fabrics like AQ. So it's a lot more complicated than PU-based fabrics simply being hydrophylic and moving liquid across the structure of the fabric...

So now you know. You can expect to find AQ in AQ2, AQ2.5 and AQ3 versions appearing in the shops come the autumn. And no, microscopic vapour bugs do not collect water molecules and carry them across the fabric, it'd be great if they did though...