Answers to "What Are The Best Materials for Making DIY Masks?"

[BigmanPigman]

https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-face-mask-virus/

This link has charts and graphs which show the materials, thicknesses, filtering abilities, etc of various items used to make masks.

"Mask:
Researchers at Cambridge University tested a wide range of household materials for homemade masks. To measure effectiveness, they shot Bacillus atrophaeus bacteria (0.93-1.25 microns) and Bacteriophage MS virus (0.023 microns in size) at different household materials.
They measured what percentage the materials could capture and compared them to the more common surgical mask."

[TwistedTinkerbelle]

1. Having made a lot of the cloth masks....

One quibble. The masks I'm making are three layers of cotton material. One of those layers is backed with fusible lining. The lining has an adhesive that sticks to the material when a hot iron is applied to the fabric making it a lot less porous than just tightly woven cotton. The patterns and materials were approved by several hospitals in North Texas.

The best is of course are the manufactured masks..no doubt about that, but the homemade masks do offer a fair amount of protection.

[alfie]

2. I have a couple of questions

When they are mentioning dish towels, are they talking about terry cloth ones or cotton/cotton blend types? Also, on the vacuum bags, is that any vacuum bag or the HEPA ones?

Anyone want to voice an opinion?

[BigmanPigman]

3. I looked at the photos on the graphs closely

and the vacuum bag is a regular one I believe. I have been looking at HEPA vacuum filters a lot and they look different, besides I think it would have had to say HEPA if it were using it. I think the towels are terry judging from the edges and pattern.

"Overall, the double layers didn’t help much. The double-layer pillowcase captured 1% more particles, and the double-layer shirt captured just 2% more particles. Yet the extra dish cloth layer boosted performance by 14%. That boost made the tea towel as effective as the surgical mask."

"Looking at the data, the dish towel and vacuum cleaner bag were the top-performing materials. However, the researchers didn’t choose these as the best materials for DIY masks".....read on at the link
https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/best-materials-make-diy-face-mask-virus/

The top performers were the vacuum cleaner bag (95%), the dish cloth (“tea towel” in the UK! 83%),

[Nay]

4. I made a mask yesterday with two outer layers of tightly woven cotton and an inner

filtering layer of terrycloth dish towel. I have to say that it is fairly hard to breathe through, but is OK for, say, an hour's run to the grocery. I can see why medical workers wouldn't be able to use this one.

Today I am making one with the cotton outer layers and a filter layer of nonwoven clothing lining material. We'll see how that one does.

[BigmanPigman]

5. I have found masks to be good and bad.

I have one of the good ones and it is hard to breath and you sweat and your skin breaks out. The good thing is that it hides your pimples and cold sores and of course keeps you safer.