Light weight tear resistant fabric

DETAILED DESCRIPTION The invention provides a light weight tear resistant fabric composed of a background fabric and meta-aramid reinforcing continuous filament yarn of comparable denier.
The meta-aramid reinforcing yarn has an elongation that is greater than two times and preferably greater than three times that of the yarns of the background fabric and has a tensile strength that is about two times but at least 1.
5 times that of the yarns of the background fabric.
The reinforcing yarn can be incorporated into a woven or knitted background fabric by replacing a small percentage of the number of yarn ends per inch (2.
54cm) of the background fabric with the reinforcing yarns.
Preferably the reinforced fabric is woven having the reinforcing yarn replacing warp and fill yarns of the background fabric such that the number of yarn ends per inch (2.
54cm) of the reinforcing yarn is from 3 to 15% of the number of yarn ends per inch (2.
54cm) in the background fabric.
Yarns of the background fabric are replaced by reinforcing yarns in each the warp and fill direction.
The resulting reinforced fabric is at least 50% stronger than the background fabric as measured by Elmendorf Tear Strength(ASTM D1424).
The reinforced fabric can be treated by techniques known in the art to be made resistant to flame and water and still retain this tear strength advantage over the tear strength the background fabric without the reinforcement.