need supplier for bonded kevlar thread

[esantoro]

I know of one source for bonded kevlar thread. I know it's expensive, but I recently had a customer headed for Kuwait. He said the desert in the middle-East cuts right through nylon and polyester threads, the latter faring a little better. He told me that the military uses kevlar. So, this got the ol'wheels spinning. I know the stuff is strong, but does it also look nice stitched. I think this might be an easy way to put my bags over the $550 mark: sell to the SUV crowd.

Ed

[barra]

If you are after heat resistant thread, also try Nomex thread. Nomex is what flight suits are made of and is designed to be very heat resistant.

Barra

[Art]

Hi Ed,

Laid (twisted) thread looks ok, is kind of light to medium yellow which looks pretty good and somewhat natural when sewn (looks a little radical when you look at the spool though). The monocord (like fishing line) doesn't look quite as good, however, the monocord is really the abrasion resistant one, especially the micro abrasion from the fine sand they have in the Middle East, which is so fine it gets down into the cords of the thread.

There is also a expanded PFTE (Teflon®), but I have never seen it in sizes over 138 equivalent, about 16lb strength. It goes by Tenara® by Gore and Profilen® by Lenzing. That is some slippery stuff and you have to set the machine up specially to use it.

Kevlar® is so strong that you could probably use the monocord sizes sucessfully.

Art

I know of one source for bonded kevlar thread. I know it's expensive, but I recently had a customer headed for Kuwait. He said the desert in the middle-East cuts right through nylon and polyester threads, the latter faring a little better. He told me that the military uses kevlar. So, this got the ol'wheels spinning. I know the stuff is strong, but does it also look nice stitched. I think this might be an easy way to put my bags over the $550 mark: sell to the SUV crowd.

Ed

[esantoro]

Thanks for the responses.

The fine sand is the very thing that does it. I read that nomex has a tensile strength quite a bit less than poly.

I think there are people our there who want something like this. They don't need it, save my one customer, but they want it. They also don't need their SUVs.

Art, your knowledge on so many things is just amazing.

Thanks,

Ed

[mugwump]

i've found this place that has both kevlar & spectra thread... not the correct size for hand stitching, but it can be doubled ,triple, quadrupled-up etc... anyway... good luck

eric

kevlar

spectra

[mugwump]

here's an additional source...

kevlar

nomex

nomex,kevlar in big boy sizes...

man... i cant believe i just replied to a 3yr old thread, thread... jeeeeeeeeeeez.... info is still good though...

eric

[rickmoo]

try ... thethreadexchange.com ... they are located in weaverville,n.c. near asheville, n.c. i've bought lots of bonded nylon and polyester machine thread . they have lots of sizes of kevlar and nomex thread.