Stiffening Fabric

In an effort to find other ways to harden fabric in the style of WW2 aircraft makers I came across something very interesting in Hobbycraft. Right next to the model aircrafts was a tiny pot of Cellulose Dope, dope was what was used to cover the material on the body of the planes, though in WW2 this was more likely to be butyrate dope. This gave me a chance to experiment with a new substance and see it's effects on the fabric whist keeping in touch with the WW2 roots of the process.

Helmet Test With Dope

I used the helmet as a base and some odd piece I had knitted from thick red wool then brushed the dope on to it with a medium coating. Once this had dried it easily came off of the helmet and was much more firm and stiff than previously, though in comparison to the resin I have used, it was flexible and somewhat unstable. In a way this was a good thing, I wanted to preserve the appearance and texture of the materials but also making them more structural which was kind of achieved. My issue with this is that it wasn't really as strong as I wanted it to be, it had the feeling of nearly breaking or losing shape, neither of which would be very helpful. It was also a cost issue, that tiny pot cost about £4 and about 25% of it was used on that little experimental piece, so hardening a whole suitcase or rifle would be expensive.

Red Piece- Dope, Brown Piece- PVA

I also tested the effect of PVA glue on the fabric in the same way as the Dope. This produced nearly identical results, though the dope may have been a little more solid. To me this concludes that if I wanted to use an alternative method to hardening the fabric than using resin, PVA would be a better option than the Cellulose Dope as it gave near enough the same results for a lot less money and it is much more accessible in large quantities.