I’m not sure how this magnified picture will show up but I took a close shot of the material and hope you can see the mesh imbedded. I have no idea the material but it all shrinks up nicely like original silkspan.
This is being called "Tea Bag Silkspan" but is being offered by a quilting supplier!! This is along the line of what I posted the other day, there is so much stuff out there that crosses over to other areas of interest that it gets confusing. We always bought silk span back in the day, and had a choice or 3 different weights at least. This product from England is only available in one weight. When Doc Span came along, it was available in two weights ( that I found) that were pretty close to each other, but not all of it was the same. It is cheap, disposable paper. Some guys used it with no problems , some didn't like it. Also through the years came a new space age material called Polyspan that could be heat shrunk and doped and was tougher than silk span, but again, had some traits that some didn't like. After a while , it was discovered that this was a common material used in garment making and such. It is called pellon and is used as a liner, stabilizer, and backing material to give the garment extra body to hold up to addition sewing and embroidery. I would have to search out the thread but I think it was Doc Holliday the pinned it down to a specific "part number" that made it easy to find. In my research, I have found that almost any material that is used for this purpose is called pellon, a sort of generic and interchangeable term, and it is ALL over the place in weight, types of material, color and such. My last job before retirement was in a custom embroidery shop and we did literally millions of patches and emblems, and these had two layers. One was a paper like material that was paper, almost like a light construction paper, then a black crushed velvet type of material was put over that, then pulled taught in a big frame. The first layer was called "pellon." When it was all tight and wrinkle free, then the embroidering started. It was also used inside baseball hats as a stabilizer to keep the stitching from puckering the material as the stiches accumulate. On hats and some other application, the paper was ripped out very easily after the stitching was finished. Look inside a lot of your base ball caps and such and you may see some on the inside, and even on embroidery on a golf shirt may have a patch of light cloth on the inside. I saw this term "stabilizer" on many bolts of material at a Hobby Lobby craft store yesterday. One bolt looked and felt just like silk span but was about 10 times too thick!! It's label said it was a 'sew-in stabilizer." It was 100% polyester and had a "40W" on it that the clerk said was the weight of the material. This got me to thinking more on the subject and the "tea bag" paper from England. I read the description on the Sugardoo website and it says it "feels just like paper used for tea bags, the paper won't be damaged by water. No need for ripping it away." This reminded me of my Grandma doing this on some quilts I saw her working on as a kid. The photo that Dave posted makes me think that this is really a pellon type material more than tea bag paper. It could be a cross over material like I mentioned. They have no EPA in England like we do that called for a change in tea bags because to make the paper white it has to be bleached to get it white and that means chlorine. They can probably do that over seas on a food product, which is what tea bags are. To be disposable it needs to be made as cheaply as possible. For use as a stabilizer for sewing and embroidery, it doesn't make any difference. The photo that Dave posted shows the weave in the material that he mentions. That's an extra step that I think they would not do for a disposable product. If you go into a Jo Ann Fabrics store and look at their selection of these type of products, it varies a lot, and it makes me think that there is no way for them to stock every kind that is available, because it isn't that critical to a garment and easy enough to get "close enough" with a similar weight material. It makes me wonder what a 10W or a 20W material would feel like ?? I took pictures of the end panels and there is a web address, " PellonProjects.com" and if you go there you will get lost in what there is available. All that needs to be done is sort through it!! That's what I hope to do and see if I can find the stuff that Doc figured out, and go from there. My thinking is that if I am correct, we can go from light to heavy and several weights of this material, we just need to know what it is and where/how to get it.. Some guys didn't like Polyspan because it wasn't light enough, but what if you could get the same material at 1/2 the weight? That's what I want to find out and verify. The point of all of this is to maybe not have to go overseas and pay as much for shipping as you do for the product. Also, remember SIG Koverall? It was just a polyester dress lining material. How many weights does that come in?
And finally, Dave!! Does this stuff tear like silk span? You know the tear test, where it will tear straight with the grain but if you tried to tear it cross grain it will turn and go straight grain??
After all this brain work, it's time for a nap!!
Type at you later,
Dan McEntee
Topic: Locked: My source for “Tea Bag” Silkspan (Read 1548 times)