Monday, November 16, 2009

An overview of hair straighteners


People nowadays spend a lot of time taking care of how they look. Not everybody is blessed with smooth and straight hair. The texture and strength of our hair is determined by our genes and the climate of where we live. Hair straighteners have revolutionized the way we style our hair. They use efficient combinations of heat and pressure to smoothen all kinds of hair. The way it works is pretty simple. Strands of hair are placed between two pieces of metal which undergo controlled heating for a specific time. The usage needs to be regulated or else it may lead to possible hair damage.

The hair straightener went through various forms before it attained the easy to use model, which is used now. Heated hair combs and clothing irons were among the earliest efforts at hair styling using heat. Special combs which had heating arrangements were brushed through the hair. The irons of those times were pretty unsafe as neither were they small enough to be handled easily nor did they have any specific heat control measures. Rods were first used in the late 1800's when a Parisian named Marcel Rateau introduced the possibility. The official patent is registered with Issac K. Shero who got two pieces of iron and put hair between them.

They way heat acts on our hair is pretty interesting. Hydrogen bonds in the hair cortex causes misshapen hair which tends to become curly. Applying heated metallic rods over them breaks those bonds letting them go straight. It allows us to make the hair bend in the desired styles as per the rod alignment. As for the material used for the heating rods, it has been changing since we started using them. Earlier versions used aluminium. Nowadays tourmaline and ceramics are preferred due to their better performance. Hair straighteners with a layer of ceramic provide even distributions of heat. They are recommended over their cheap alternatives, which can cause more damage than style. We should consider their usage as a privilege to be restricted for special occasions. Daily heat impact on your hair will make it suffer irrespective of how much you spent

by: Hollie Wilcox

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