Certified alpaca test – Standard

Art of Fibre’s ‘Quality Control Program’ for testing alpaca fibre

As wool testing devices are designed and programmed for testing sheep’s wool, the testing of alpaca fibre needs to account for the very low levels/absence of lanolin and the differences in fibre type and diameter variation compared to sheep’s wool. Knowledge of the settings and methods to test alpaca fibre have been developed by Art of Fibre over the 25 years we have been supporting alpaca breeders.

Our ‘Certified alpaca testing’ is subject to our own QA program. As the only industry standards for testing fibre are relevant to the testing of sheep’s wool, Art of Fibre have developed their own Quality Control scheme specific to testing alpaca fibre. This scheme includes:

1/  Twice daily calibration check using manufacturer’s calibration slide with polyester fibres.

2/  Calibration check for every testing batch using a reference alpaca sample for which the test results are known.

3/  The OFDA2000’s carry out a built in calibration check where it measures at regular intervals, 4 wire fibres with diameters ranging from 10 to 100 microns. If the the calibration check does not measure the fibres at the known diameter, the device will not function.

4/  Regular comparative testing trial using 5 alpaca samples that are tested on both our OFDA2000 devices to ensure any differences do not exceed acceptable margin of error of 0.3 microns.

5/  Twice a year, 10 alpaca samples are tested on both our OFDA’s with the same samples sent to the OFDA manufacturer in Western Australia and one other independent laboratory with experience with testing alpaca fibre.

6/  If any of the above checks result in discrepancies above the acceptable margin of error, testing services are frozen until the issue is resolved.

A certificate of compliance for any ‘Certified alpaca testing’ we carry out is available on request.

**For goat fibres, Art Of Fibre recommends an alpaca fibre test, however, we regret no certificate of compliance can be provided for goat fibre testing.