"Determining the Quality of a Microfiber Towel"

Microfiber towels are a revolutionary, environmentally friendly, and extremely effective way to clean. However, in order to get the most out of your towels it's important to make sure you're purchasing high quality microfiber towels. In this article you'll find tests to determining the quality of a microfiber towel.

The first and probably most important test to determine the quality of a microfiber towel is touch. How does the towel feel to the touch? Is the microfiber cloth soft? Would you trust it on the finish of your car? Does the material ""grab"" the imperfections on your skin when you run the towel over the palm of your hand? You want this to happen... when you can feel the towel grabbing your skin that means it's a microfiber towel made from split microfiber. High quality microfiber cleaning cloths feature split microfiber, after the splitting process each microfiber in a microfiber towel looks like an asterisk if you're looking at a cross section of the fiber. The open spaces in the microfiber created by the splitting process allow the microfiber cleaning cloth to pick up and hold dirt as well as absorbing liquid. If you don't feel a ""grab"" from the towel it may not be split, if it's not split it won't be any more effective as a cleaning towel than a cotton rag.

Another test you can use to determine the quality of microfiber is an absorbency test. Pour a little water on a flat, smooth surface, take a folded microfiber cleaning cloths and slowly slide the towel towards the puddle. Carefully observe as the towel contacts the water. Does it suck the water up like a vacuum? Does it push the water away? Is it somewhere in between? Does the water quickly wick through the towel? You want a towel that sucks the water up like a vacuum and you want the water to wick throughout the towel, these are characteristics of high quality, absorbent microfiber towels.

The third test you can use to determine quality is to weigh it. The reason is simple; a heavier towel has more microfiber in it. Microfiber weight is measured in grams per square meter (GSM) (conversion calculators can be found online). A good quality microfiber towel should weigh 250 GSM at the very least, usually more.

A few more simple tests you can use are the sunlight test and the stretch test. Neither of these are very scientific, but they do give you a little insight into the quality of the microfiber towel. For the sunlight test just take the towel out in the sun and stretch it out between you and the sun, if you can see a lot of sunlight through it like a cheesecloth it's not a high quality microfiber cleaning cloths. For the stretch test just stretch the towel, generally speaking, if it easily stretches it's not a very high quality woven material.

None of these tests alone should be used to judge a microfiber cleaning cloth, however when you use several of these tests together you can get a good idea of the quality of the microfiber towel. For example, a chain warehouse store sells package of microfiber towels that weigh more than 300 GSM, it is dense (passes the sunlight test), and it doesn't stretch. However they don't work very well as a cleaning towel, they're not absorbent and they don't pick up and hold dust very well. This towel would pass the weight test but wouldn't pass the touch (it doesn't grab the imperfections in the skin) and absorbency tests (it pushes water instead of sucking it up).