Singe

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Singe

A singe is a slight scorching, burn or treatment with flame. This may be due to an accident, such as scorching one's hair when lighting a gas fire, or a deliberate method of treatment or removal of hair or other fibres.

Hairdressing
A singe is a treatment available at a barber

Barber

A barber is someone whose occupation is to cut any type of hair, give shaving, and trim beards. In previous times, barbers also performed surgery and dentistry....
's. A lit taper

Candle

A candle is a source of light, and sometimes a source of heat, consisting of a solid block of fuel and an embedded candle wick.Today, most candles are made from paraffin....
(candle) or other device is used to lightly burn and shrivel the hair. This is supposed to have beneficial effects - sealing cut ends, closing up the follicle

Hair follicle

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Hairdressing

A singe is a treatment available at a barber

Barber

A barber is someone whose occupation is to cut any type of hair, give shaving, and trim beards. In previous times, barbers also performed surgery and dentistry....
's. A lit taper

Candle

Hair follicle

A hair follicle is part of the skin that grows hair by packing old Cell s together. Attached to the follicle is a sebaceous gland, a tiny sebum-producing gland found everywhere except on the hands, lips and soles of the feet....
s, preventing the hair from bleeding and encouraging it to grow. This practice was popular approximately a century ago; it was believed that hair had "fluid" in it and singeing would trap the fluid in. This belief has since been debunked. Singeing is still sometimes used to bond natural hair to hair extensions.

Primitive cultures have also used singeing as a means to trim scalp or body hair, as a part of normal grooming or during ritual activity.

Sir Francis Drake

Francis Drake

Sir Francis Drake, Vice Admiral , was an England sea captain, privateer, navigation, slaver, and politics of the Elizabethan era. Elizabeth I of England awarded Drake a knighthood in 1581....
was famously said to have singed the King of Spain's beard when he raided Cadiz

Francis Drake

Agriculture

In the agricultural industry, poultry

Poultry

Poultry is the category of domesticated birds which some people keep for the purpose of collecting their egg , or kill for their meat and/or feathers....
and pork

Pork

Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig . The word, pork, is often meant to denote specifically the fresh meat of the pig, but it can be used as an all-inclusive term, to include cured, smoked, or processed meats It is one of the most-commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig animal husbandry dating back...
is singed to remove stub feather

Feather

Feathers are one of the epidermal growths that form the distinctive outer covering, or plumage, on birds. They are considered the most complex integumentary structures found in vertebrates....
s and bristle

Bristle

A bristle is a stiff hair or feather. Also used are synthetic materials such as nylon in items such as brooms and sweepers. Bristles are often used to make brushes for cleaning uses, as they are strongly abrasive; common examples include the toothbrush and toilet brush....
s.

Textiles

In the textile industry

Textile industry

The Textile industry is a term used for industries primarily concerned with the design or manufacture of clothing as well as the distribution and use of textiles....
, loose fibres protruding on the surface of textile

Textile

A textile is a flexible material consisting of a network of natural or artificial fibres often referred to as thread or yarn. Yarn is produced by Spinning raw wool fibres, linen, cotton, or other material on a spinning wheel to produce long strands known as yarn....
goods are singed to remove them. When done to fabric

Textile

Cotton

Cotton is a soft, staple fiber that grows in a form known as a boll around the seeds of the cotton plant a shrub native to tropical and subtropical regions around the world, including the Americas, India and Africa....
, this results in increased wettability, better dyeing

Dyeing

Dyeing is the process of imparting colours to a textile material in loose fibre, yarn, cloth or garment form by treatment with a dye....
characteristics, improved reflection, no "frosty" appearance, a smoother surface, better clarity in printing, improved visibility of the fabric structure, less pilling and decreased contamination through removal of fluff and lint.

The process is usually to pass one or both sides of a fabric over a gas flame to burn off the protruding fibres. Other methods include infra-red or heat for thermoplastic

Thermoplastic

A thermoplastic is a polymer that turns to a liquid when heated and freezes to a very glassy state when cooled sufficiently. Most thermoplastics are high-molecular mass polymers whose Chain s associate through weak Van der Waals forces ; stronger dipole interactions and hydrogen bonding ; or even stacking of aromatic rings ....
fibers. Singeing of yarn

Yarn

Yarn is a long continuous length of interlocked fibers, suitable for use in the production of textiles, sewing, crocheting, knitting, weaving, embroidery and ropemaking....
s is called "gassing". It is usually the first step after weaving

Weaving

Weaving is the textile arts in which two distinct sets of yarn, called the Warp and the filling or weft , are interlaced with each other to form a textile....
or knitting

Knitting

Knitting is a method by which yarn may be turned into cloth. Knitting consists of loops called stitches pulled through each other. The active stitches are held on a needle until another loop can be passed through them....
, though the fabric may be brushed first to raise the surface fibres.

Cellulose fibres such as cotton are easily singed because the protruding fibers burn to a light ash which is easily removed. Thermoplastic fibres are harder to singe because they melt and form hard residues on the fabric surface.

Singe

Hairdressing

Agriculture

Textiles

See also