What do the different colours mean? And, what hi-vis should you be wearing?
Xinxing FR Product Page
Hi-Vis is hardly the height of fashion. Although&#;it has probably been used in an obscure fashion line at some point.
You may be on a construction site, attending a football match or visiting a festival. Hi-Vis is an integral part of society and can be seen in varying formats and styles.
So, what do the different colours mean? And, what hi-vis should you be wearing?
The purpose of hi-vis is to make you stand out from your surroundings.
Whilst the most common colour of hi-vis is fluorescent yellow, it isn&#;t always the best choice.
Hi-vis uses reflective bands to make you more noticeable in low-level light and headlights.
When you&#;re more noticeable an accident is less likely to occur. The sooner a driver sees a person the more time they have to react.
These are the type of hi-vis vests that you may see at a festival or a concert. They can be used to denote a person&#;s role such as a steward or first aider.
Coloured hi-vis doesn&#;t make you to stand out from your surroundings enough to conform to standard EN. They aren&#;t appropriate for hazard prevention.
Some brands choose colourful hi-vis for their workforce, as the colours align with their uniform. Yet those who wear these garments aren&#;t involved in hazardous roles.
When looking at Blackrock&#;s hi-vis sleeveless vests there are six colours available.
Both the orange and yellow vests conform to standard EN Class 2. The green, navy, pink and red vests do not.
Orange hi-vis is used by rail workers.
Why?
Very often, rail work is done in green environments. Fluorescent orange is far more visible than yellow in this scenario. Orange won&#;t blend in.
Yellow is used more indoors as it is a brighter colour and can be seen better in low-level light.
A two-tone hi-vis uses two separate colours. A fluorescent colour and another colour (fluorescent or not).
If some fluorescent material is replaced with non-fluorescent material, the garment may be put into a different hi-vis category (see below).
The main purpose of two-tone hi-vis is to differentiate between staff roles or locations. For example, someone working in warehouses A and B would wear a different colour hi-vis.
That said some two-tone garments do have practical benefits. Darker panelling on the lower half of the garment can help to protect against dirt.
Within the Blackrock range, there is a good example of how hi-vis colouring can affect its class.
Four two-tone high vis waistcoats conform to at EN Class 2. The others, as they contain less fluorescent material, conform to EN Class 1.
In contrast, the hi-vis two-tone bomber and coat conform to EN Class 3 &#; the highest standard. This is due to the amount of fluorescent fabric that&#;s visible.
Not to be confused with the English class system.
Hi-vis is divided up into different classes depending on two things: the amount of fluorescent material and reflective tape on show.
You may have noticed that smaller sizes of hi-vis are unusually long.
This is done to increase the quantity of fluorescent fabric. And enable the garment to conform to the same standard as an extra-large in the same range.
There are three classes of hi-vis: Class 1, 2 & 3. The amount of fluorescent material and reflective tape determines what class the hi-vis falls into.
Hi-vis Class 1: Lowest Visibility Level
Two-tone hi-vis vests and hi-vis trousers
Hi-vis Class 2: High Visibility Level
Sleeveless Hi-Vis vests
Hi-vis Class 3: Highest Visibility Level
Hi-Vis Coats & Bombers and long sleeve hi-vis vests & garments
There are two ways to achieve class 3 visibility:
The hi-vis you wear should be in line with the risks found in the risk assessment.
If you are working in a role that requires you to wear a hi-vis, then your employer must provide you with the appropriate clothing.
If you&#;re in charge of choosing hi-vis for yourself or your employees, consider this:
If there is a high risk you&#;ll be hit by a moving vehicle, class 3 hi-vis should be worn, providing the maximum amount of visibility. In this scenario, you may require extra hi-vis for full coverage on your legs.
If there is a medium risk you will be hit by a moving vehicle, at least class 2 hi-vis should be worn.
Class 1 hi-vis is usually reserved for roadside assistance personnel, volunteers, and delivery drivers where the risks are lower.
If you&#;re outdoors, in a wooded area, an orange garment is required. Yellow hi-vis will blend in with the surrounding environment.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of fluro fabric. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.
Is the lighting in your workplace gloomy? If so, orange hi-vis won&#;t be as visible.
In short, when choosing hi-vis garments, ensure that the level of risk has been considered, as has the environment where the work is done.
Differentiating between the colours of hi-vis can help to see different job roles, but extra colours may reduce the garments class.
Hi-vis isn&#;t a fashion item. And yet it does have the same purpose &#; to make you stand out.
Get in contact with us so we can help you stand out.
According to Park (), a Korean survey of road cleaners and police officers revealed that their main dissatisfaction with warning clothing is &#;humidity and hotness due to poor sweat absorption&#;. Thus, the study focused on improving such areas of dissatisfaction in order to produce practical results. The results are as follows.
Table 1 shows the characteristics of four fluorescent fabrics used in this study. The composition of the fibers largely consisted of PET and the order of their thickness was S2&#;>&#;S3&#;>&#;S1&#;>&#;S4. S4 was only about half of S2 and S3. Fabric count was in the order of S1&#;>&#;S3&#;>&#;S2&#;>&#;S4 in the warp direction and S1&#;&#;&#;S3&#;&#;&#;S4&#;>&#;S2 in the weft direction. S1 had the highest warp and weft density.
Table 1 Characteristics of 4 fluorescent fabric samplesFull size table
The structure of the fabric (thickness and porosity) is a factor that determines air permeability and water vapor resistance (Yoon and Buckley ). In Table 1 and Fig. 1, it can be deduced from S2 (low density) and S4 (low density and low thickness) that greater porosity and thinner thickness increases water vapor permeability. Behmann (, as cited in Nam ) reported that moisture evaporation was affected by surface characteristics (Fig. 1), and Mecheels and Umbach (, as cited in Tamura ) reported that moisture absorption effected comfort. Therefore, related discussions about the results of each experiment are provided.
Fig. 1Morphologies of SEM photos of 4 fluorescent fabric samples
Full size image
Figure 1 shows scanning electron microscope (SEM) photographs taken at 200× magnification of the four kinds of fluorescent fabrics. The weave construction of S1, S2, S3, and S4 were found to be fancy plain weave, twill weave (gabardine), fancy plain weave, and plain weave, respectively.
Air permeability in comparison to ISO-compliant S2 as the basis (100%) was similar at 101.7% for S1 and 72.4% for S4, but very low for S3 at 20.8% (Table 2). Air permeability is associated with heat transfer and is known to have a great influence on comfort (Mecheels and Umbach ; Tamura ; The Japan Society of Home Economics ). Therefore, S1 and S2, which showed high air permeability, would be more advantageous for comfort in hot weather conditions than the other samples.
Increases in skin surface humidity cause unpleasantness and stickiness; therefore, it is desirable that material contacting with the skin has excellent moisture absorption and water vapor permeability qualities (Tamura ; Park ). In the study, moisture regain was the highest in S2 (1.11%), followed by S1 (0.53%) >&#;S3 (0.10%) &#;&#;S4 (0.06%) (Table 2). The Korean samples S1, S3 and S4 fell short of ISO standards and PET 100% fabrics were low in moisture regain and expected to be the most uncomfortable during wear.
Fabric water vapor permeability is important for water vapor transportation which influences comfort (Tamura ). Water vapor permeability ranked in the order of S2 (10,885) &#;&#;S4 (10,705) >&#;S3 () >&#;S1 ( g/m2 24 h). Considering S2 as 100%, S4 was 98.3%, S3 was 88.5%, and S1 was 82.7%, but all of them were more than 80% with no major differences (Table 2).
Clothing material air permeability, moisture regain, and water vapor permeability significantly influence the wearer&#;s thermal sensation, humidity sensation, and comfort sensation. The sample materials in this study are all for spring/fall and summer seasons; therefore, their air permeability and moisture regain can be lacking for optimal wear sensation during summer working conditions. Out of all four samples, S2 seemed to be the most superior in wear comfort, followed by S1 which scored similarly except for moisture regain. S3 had the lowest air permeability and low moisture regain with a high potential to cause discomfort due to hotness and humidity.
The survey conducted on workers with experience wearing safety clothing made of S1 material indicated that the main reasons for its dissatisfactory wearing experience were hotness and humidity (Park ). Natural persimmon juice dyeing was suggested to mitigate weaknesses by increasing air permeability, moisture regain, and water vapor permeability of the S1 fabric. Therefore, for further discussion of the study results, immature persimmon juice dye was subsequently applied to S1 fabric and the effect of persimmon juice dyeing was determined through a comparative analysis. By setting the larger value as 100%, the moisture regain ratio of undyed to dyed fabric was 2.21% (77.3%): 2.86% (100.0%), showing more than 20% increase; similarly the air permeability ratio of undyed to dyed fabric was 41.7 (100.0%): 39.6 (95.0%). Finally, water vapor permeability was slightly elevated from (92.8%) to 10,468 (100.0%) after dyeing. Persimmon juice dyeing increased fabric moisture regain by 22.7% and water vapor permeability by 7.2%. This result follows previous studies where the dyeing of cotton and rayon fabric with persimmon juice increased the moisture regain and water vapor permeability as well as micro-humidity within the experimental clothing worn by the test subject (Ko and Lee ; Park ; Park and Kang ; Park and Son ). Thus, it is evident that the wear comfort for S1 can be significantly enhanced through a natural dyeing method using persimmon juice. In this study, the air permeability decrease of 5.0% was due to the highly dense warp count of S1 compared to rayon and cotton used in the former study. However, a prior study indicated that persimmon juice dyeing increased the air permeability of cotton, rayon, and silk fabric (Park and Park ). The natural dyeing process in this study (dip dyeing in a 2:1 mixture of water: persimmon juice) and drying in the sunlight after washing is compatible with sustainable development and evolving global standards for environmentally friendly practices in the field of textiles and clothing.
An effective release of heat and moisture of the micro-climate in hot conditions is associated with comfort; however, it causes discomfort when water remains in the micro-climate between clothes and skin. Therefore, it is necessary to research ways to improve moisture absorption characteristics due to water vapor permeability and moisture transportation are directly related to wear comfort.
Table 2 Comparison of properties of fluorescent fabric samplesFull size table
Tensile strength and elongation refers to durability and resilience due to external forces and is one of the characteristics that restrains human motion during the wearing of clothing (Kim et al. ; Ko and Lee ). Table 2 shows the tensile strength measurements of warp and weft directions. Tensile strength in the warp direction was similar for S1, S2, and S3, but lower in S4. In the weft direction, tensile strength ranked S1&#;>&#;S2&#;&#;&#;S4&#;&#;&#;S3, and S1 had a tensile strength that is 2&#;2.5 times greater than the other three samples. Elongation showed a distinct difference between warp and weft directions, and S1 displayed the best warp elongation and S3 the best weft elongation. Additionally, S3 showed the biggest difference between warp and weft elongation.
Abrasion strength of S1, S2, and S4 were all above 20,000 and satisfied the general expectation level. However, abrasion strength of S3 was less than 15,300 and denoted poor durability (Table 2).
The rate of size change after washing the four samples fell within 1&#;1.5% shrinkage in the warp direction and 0.5&#;1.0% shrinkage in the weft direction, but the results were not influenced by washing five times (Table 2).
Table 3 shows that the washing, dry-cleaning, friction, acid and alkali compound, and dry and wet hot-pressing colorfastness were excellent in all four samples, scoring between Grades 4 and Grade 5 (not shown in Table 3). The sunlight fastness was above Grade 4 in all samples and there was no difference observed between the samples. In addition, all the contaminated pieces appeared to have Grade 4 and Grade 5 in the washing and dry-cleaning fastness and indicated that dye transfer stains did not occur.
Table 3 Colorfastness of 4 sample fabrics on washing, dry-cleaning, friction, sunlight, compound (sweat&#;+&#;sunlight), and hot-pressingFull size table
From all results of above 7 physical characteristics, it was found that S1 (a Korean material) has a higher possibility of complying with ISO standards, except that the moisture regain is relatively lower than S2. Therefore, it is recommended to increase the mixing ratio of cotton fiber, which is absorbent and also comfortable, in S1 to more than 10% or surface finishing. However, S3 appeared to be lacking air permeability, moisture regain, and abrasion strength; S4 lacked moisture regain, air permeability and tensile strength.
Figure 2 shows SEM photos of the surface (a) and cross-section (b) of each sample. R1 and R4 are glass bead-types while R2 and R3 are prism-types. A comparison of R1 and R4 shows that bigger and more homogeneous beads improve retroreflection (Kang and Choi ). There is an industrial trend toward prism-types due to their better retroreflection in rain (Park and Choi ).
Fig. 2Morphologies of SEM photos of surface (a) and cross-section (b) for each sample
Full size image
Luminance (cd/m2) is the luminous intensity (cd) per unit of area of a light travelling in a particular direction. Luminance varies depending on observation angle and if under a constant light source; in addition, a more reflective object results in a higher luminance intensity (Smith ; Yang and Lee ; Ji et al. ).
Table 4 shows the chromaticity/luminance measurements of the four materials tested in this study. Luminance was measured at 5 cm intervals using an instrument with a measuring diameter of 5 mm. Out of all four samples, R1 and R2 showed similar results; R3 had a luminance factor of 0.09, being the lowest. Therefore, luminance ranked in the order of R4&#;>&#;R2&#;&#;&#;R1&#;>&#;R3.
Table 4 Chromaticity measurement values of the 4 samplesFull size table
ISO specifies fluorescent fabric colors; however, there is no standard for coloring retroreflective materials. Table 4 indicates the coordinate x and y values for the color of the retroreflective materials. For coordinate x, a higher value denotes red color and lower value denotes green color. For coordinate y, a higher value denotes yellow color and lower value denotes blue color. However, the values are only descriptive of the colors and have no relation with reflective performance.
The observation angle is the angle at which the light enters the driver&#;s eyes from a light source that is reflected by a road sign or other objects with retroreflective materials attached. Incidence angle is the angle between the light source and the normal line of a road sign, which distinguishes vehicles in the first and fourth lane, or vehicles closer and further from the road sign.
The general reflective property values shown in Table 5 indicate the intensity of the light entering the driver&#;s eyes after being reflected by a retroreflective surface of a road sign and warning clothing. The angles of 0° and 12&#; are important because they correspond to light that effects the driver the most. The larger the observation angle is, the higher the driver is situated above ground; 1°30&#; represents the angle of light observed by the driver of a larger vehicle such as cargo truck. ε&#;=&#;90° indicates light hitting the observer from the side. All measurements were in compliance with ISO (). ISO shows that the minimum satisfactory retroreflection factor for one of the two orientations ε&#;=&#;0° or ε&#;=&#;90° is 75% (for example, at 12&#; and 5°) if the factor is greater than 250, which is approximately 75% of 330. The four samples tested in this study all passed this score.
Table 5 General retroreflective property values measured at 0° (frontal light) and 90° (lateral light)Full size table
The samples R1 (3M material) and R4 both had relatively consistent results and less deviation in regards to the changing angles; the deviation values ranked in the order of R3&#;>&#;R2&#;&#;&#;R1&#;&#;&#;R4. R3&#;s deviation was the greatest and higher than R2 (despite the same manufacturer) due to the presence/absence of patterns. R3 (a directional material) showed measurements that varied the most between ε&#;=&#;0° and ε&#;=&#;90°, and it resulted in the poorest retroreflective properties among all samples at an observation angle of 1°30&#; and may not be adequately visible to drivers in vehicles such as trucks.
Table 6 shows the retroreflective property measurements of the four samples after exposure to 5 conditions (abrasion, bending, bending at low temperature, temperature change, and washing 5 times) at an observation angle of 12&#; (0.2°) and incidence angle of 5°. Bigger numbers represent better retroreflective properties, and R3; in addition, the prism-type plain sample made by &#;R&#; company showed the highest deviation while also displaying the highest numbers. However, R1 which is a 3M product sample had the steadiest results with the smallest deviation among conditions. R1, a global manufacturer occupying 45% of the world use (Kang and Choi ), can be considered the basis for a comparative assessment. Thus, assuming R1&#;s results as the basis for comparison (100%), the other samples ranged between 81.4 and 158.4%. Subsequently, R3 showed the largest deviation.
Table 6 Retroreflective properties at 12&#; (0.2°) observation angle and 5° incidence angle after 5 conditionsFull size table
The plain retroreflective material (R3) in comparison to rectangular material (R2) (Reflomax ) is concerned inferior in empirical evaluations in terms of reflecting lateral light and under rainy conditions. This study found that R3&#;s visibility for children&#;s clothing was higher than R2 in a bright setting; however, it was lower in a darker environment. For this reason, prism-type rectangular-patterned material is currently used in police uniforms despite the cheaper price of plain material.
The four types of retroreflective material samples tested in this study were ISO compliant in terms of general criteria and after exposure to the five conditions. R2 and R3 also passed ISO certification. Currently available materials made in Korea also have viable quality.
For more information, please visit Fireproof Woven Textile Exporter.