The World Cup, an event for the citizens of the world that captures the world’s interest and attention, is right around the corner. The World Cup teams make every effort to maintain their top condition and to show off their best athletic performance.
We cannot help but to mention the uniforms.
The clothes and shoes worn by World Cup athletes are well known as the gems of cutting-edge science.
Recently, the cutting-edge uniforms of the qualifying countries for the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa were introduced and captured people’s interests. Nike, the sponsor of the Korean national soccer team, defined this uniform as ‘slim,’ ‘comfortable’ and ‘environment-friendly’ and introduced its new characteristics.
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‘Slim’ and ‘comfortable’ uniforms are absolutely necessary for athletes who have to play for 90 minutes in the humid and hot weather of South Africa. This uniform, worn by the Korean national soccer team, is lighter than the one from the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany by 15% and weighs only about 130g. Moreover, it has the most advanced quick absorbing and drying function, which absorbs and dries perspiration. Air flow was improved by over 7% compared to previous uniforms. This was done by increasing the rate of air penetration through the fiber itself by placing 200 small air holes. In addition to this, the uniforms are made to not stretch and tear when scuffled by strengthening its elasticity. The slim silhouette could be achieved due to higher adhesion than previous uniforms.
The Korean national soccer team’s uniforms are becoming a hot topic in cutting-edge science functions and environment-friendly features. The uniforms worn by the Korean national soccer team is made from discarded plastic bottles. It is ‘Ecoever,’ a recycled yarn made from plastic bottles, of Huvis (www.huvis.com / CEO Seong Hwan Mun), the nation’s largest polyester company.
‘Ecoever,’ is a yarn extracted from collecting discarded plastic bottles. It decreases the amount of trash in landfills and reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 30% in the manufacturing process. In addition, it is an environment-friendly yarn that reduces unnecessary use of oil resources and reduces energy emissions.Because raw materials for plastic bottles, TPA and EG, are also used as raw materials for polyester, they can be reproduced as chips, which are raw materials for fiber. Chips are produced through a refinement operation that removes impurities by pulverizing plastic bottles into small pieces. Because Samyang Corporation, the parent company of Huvis, collects disposed plastic bottles and provides the raw materials while Huvis produces the yarn, integrated quality management is possible. Huvis was exclusively awarded the environment-friendly fiber label from Korea’s Ministry of Environment and was certified as Nike’s official yarn supply vendor.
People think recycled yarns are lower in function and quality, but ‘Ecoever’ has same features as existing functional fibers. It has quick absorbing/ drying function, which absorbs and dries perspiration and maintains comfortable conditions, and antibacterial/ deodorant functions, which eliminate unpleasant odors. Therefore, recycled yarns are being reborn as cutting-edge World Cup team uniforms. With Korea’s team uniforms, one T-shirt can be produced with 8 plastic bottles.
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Samyang Corporation
Disposed plastic bottles collection -> compression -> bottle cap removal -> primary cleansing -> classification by color and labels removal -> secondary cleansing -> pulverization -> tertiary cleansing -> final removal of foreign substances (metal detector) -> flake -> extraction of impurities from chemical refining operation -> chip (plastic rice grain type pellet)
Huvis
Polymerization process (melting chips using heat and pressure) -> Spinning process (passing slurry type of raw materials through nozzle wholes) -> Stretching process (stretching threads to give stable physical property) -> Coiling Process (coiling threads around a bobbin in standard amounts)