Grammar
What is Grammar?
Grammage is a unit used to describe the weight of fabrics, but also papers and foils. The unit of measurement always refers to an area of one square meter. The grammage refers to the weight of the fabric in grams per square meter (g/m²). This plays a crucial role in the effect of textiles.
What is “Nm”?
The running length of a yarn and thus also the yarn thickness can be determined from the letters “Nm” and the number or combination of numbers behind them. The first number indicates how many meters one gram of yarn is long. The second number, if any, indicates the twist.
The numerical-metric value
“Nm” is the abbreviation for numerical-metric. The higher the numerical metric value, the finer the yarn. A yarn with Nm 9 is three times thinner than a yarn with Nm 3.
Twisted yarns
Nm 30/2 is a double-twisted yarn. This means that 30 meters of yarn weighs 2 grams. In simple terms, the overall fineness would be Nm 15. This results in a barrel length of 1,500 meters per 100 grams.
What does Nm have to do with grammage?
Both Nm and grammage tell us something about our material. Nm tells us how fine the yarns used for our fabric are. Grammar can tell us something about the thickness of our fabric.
Which grammage is the right one?
Which grammage is best depends on the intended use of the material. The grammage can influence the look and feel of the textile. If you would like to have textiles manufactured by us, we offer you various textile products made from different raw materials and different grammages. If you don't know which grammage is suitable, we will be happy to advise you so that the textile ultimately turns out the way you imagined it.
What do different grammages do?
Grammar doesn't just say something about the weight of a material. It also influences the durability of the fabric, as well as the look and feel of the finished textile product. However, you should note that a thicker fabric is not necessarily better than a thinner fabric. Likewise, a thinner, finer fabric is not automatically of higher quality than a thicker fabric.
The quality depends on the material and the manufacturing process. Depending on the purpose for which a material is manufactured, the grammage must be determined individually. The grammage of a fabric that is suitable for thin blouses is no worse quality than that used for a thicker hoody. The grammage must always be matched to the corresponding textile in order to achieve the desired effect.
How can you calculate the grammage?
If you have a piece of fabric and a precise scale, you can calculate the grammage as follows.
Fabric weight x 10,000 / fabric length in centimeters x fabric width in centimeters
The factor 10,000 only applies if the dimensions are given in cm. Because that is the conversion factor from cm² to m².
Different grammages in comparison
Although the grammage doesn't tell us anything about the quality of a fabric, it does give us information about the different thicknesses of a fabric if the material is the same and the same method of production. For T-shirts, for example, grammages of 150-200 g/m² are suitable. But there are also thinner qualities for airy shirts with grammages under 120 g/m². There are also significantly thicker T-shirts with weights over 220 g/m². A jersey fabric with a grammage of 280-300 g/m² is already well suited for light sweatshirts.