A fabric turns boardy when too much binder, too high a bond area, too hot a calender or too much nip pressure fuses the fibers into a rigid sheet. It loses softness and drape and can crack when folded. Boardy hand is one of the most common panel complaints on hygiene and medical fabrics.
Second shift ran the calender hot and now the whole batch is boardy, it rustles like paper.
Boardy fabric off the calender rarely recovers, so treat it as a downgrade, not a rework.
Also heard as
- papery
- stiff
- harsh
Related terms
Hand
How a fabric feels to the touch: softness, smoothness, stiffness, drape and warmth taken together.
Drape
How readily a fabric hangs and folds under its own weight, a comfort property for gowns, drapes and wipes.
Thermal bonding
Bonding a web by heating it so thermoplastic fibers or binder fibers soften and fuse at their crossing points.
Bond area
Percentage of a point-bonded fabric's surface covered by fused bond points.