Handmade Irish crafts & craft supplies for home craftspeople
The Face Mask created as part of this publication should NOT be used as a replacement for conventional and approved Personal Protective Equipment. The instructions, pattern or the face masks have not been industry tested nor has it been HSE approved. The instructions, patterns or face masks below shall not constitute or be deemed to constitute any representation by the authors, this web site or any affiliates, and is intended for educational purposes only. The decision to use this device is solely your own.
FREE FACE MASK INSTRUCTIONS
This is a free resource for the home crafter, below are step by step instructions to assist you in creating your free face mask.
We have made three patterns which can be downloaded free. Please click on the buttons above to download your pattern. The patterns available are Men’s, Women’s / Teenager & Kids.
Materials:
1. Fabric for front of mask 14” X 7”. You could consider up cycling your pre washed favorite old shirt.
2. Filter material 10” X 5”. We are using 4 oz Wadding. You can use whatever is to hand, possibly a piece of toweling material.
3. Fabric for the rear of mask 14” X 6”. We are using Poly Cotton. We have also used a pre washed T Shirt material.
4. Elastic cord depending on the size of head 12”-18”. If you do not have this to hand you could use twine, cord, ribbon, even an old shoe lace. Remember to check your length as these will not stretch & will have to be tied.
Equipment:
1. Sewing machine or you can hand sew?
2. Chalk, marker, pencil, pen or anything which you can mark the material with.
3. Scissors or cutting wheel.
4. Pins, to pin pattern to fabric when marking & cutting, not essential.
1. Download & open the PDF free mask pattern in the size required.
2. Print the pattern out. N.B. Make sure that you select print to ACTUAL Size. Once printed check that the rectangle at the top of the page is 2” wide.
3. Add a seam allowance to your
pattern. This can be done by sellotaping two pens together & tracing the
pattern. At the flat part of the pattern we add 1” this makes it easy to fold
in the last step. You do not have to do this but it can be quite difficult to
get this fold nice & neat if not.
5. On your next piece of front material flip the pattern over & repeat step 4. You have both front facing pieces cut now.
6. Next mark out and cut the lining material, I am using the same here as the front. Draw your ¼” seam allowance front, top & bottom. We do not need a seam allowance at the back.
Congratulations! Your mask is finished.
If you need any help, please contact us by email.
info@creativecrafts.ie
With masks sold out during the coronavirus outbreak, many people will have to make do with what some scientists have called “the last resort”: the DIY mask.
Data shows that DIY and homemade masks are effective at capturing viruses. But if forced to make our own mask, what material is best suited to make a mask? As the coronavirus spread around China, netizens reported making masks with tissue paper, kitchen towels, cotton clothing fabrics, and even oranges!
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.
Not surprisingly, the surgical mask performed best, capturing 97% of the 1-micron bacteria. Yet every single material filtered out at least 50% of particles. The top performers were the vacuum cleaner bag (95%), the dish cloth (“tea towel” in the UK! 83%), the cotton blend shirt fabric (74%), and the 100% cotton shirt (69%).
The test above used bacteria that were 1 micron large, yet the coronavirus is just 0.1 microns – ten times smaller. Can homemade masks capture smaller virus particles? To answer this question, the scientists tested 0.02 micron Bacteriophage MS2 particles (5 times smaller than the coronavirus).
On average, the homemade masks captured 7% fewer virus particles than the larger bacteria particles. However, all of the homemade materials managed to capture 50% of virus particles or more (with the exception of the scarf at 49%).
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:
Instead, they concluded the pillowcase and the 100% cotton t-shirt are the best materials for DIY masks. Why?
The answer lies in breathability. How easy it is to breathe through your mask is an important factor that will affect how comfortable it is. And comfort isn’t merely a luxury. Comfort will influence how long you can wear your mask.
Fortunately, in addition to particle effectiveness, the researchers tested the pressure drop across each type of fabric. This gives us a good indication of how easy it is to breathe through each material. As a benchmark, they compared breathability of each DIY mask material to the surgical mask.
Although the tea towel and the vacuum bag captured the most particles, they were also the hardest to breath through. With two layers, the tea towel was over twice as hard to breathe through as the surgical mask. In contrast, the pillow case, t-shirt, scarf, and linen were all easier to breathe through than the surgical mask.
This article was published by Paddy Robertson Coronavirus, Masks on the 8th of March 2020. All credit & copyright belongs to the author & smart air filters.Offering wonderful products as affordable prices.
Cregg
Mayglass
Co.Wexford
Ireland
Mayglass
Wexford
Co. Wexford
Ireland
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