Orthopedics, Prosthetics & Patient Positioning

Orthopedic braces typically use a soft, low-shed loop tape — most often a knit nylon loop or an unnapped loop — paired with either a soft woven hook (for skin-adjacent comfort) or a plastic molded hook (for higher shear strength and cycle life). For brace closures designed to be opened and closed thousands of times, HALCO® Type 3 and Type 4 molded hook engaged with HALCO® Unnapped Loop is a common combination. For low-profile closures where strap bulk matters — wrist splints, carpal tunnel supports, post-operative compression wraps, light braces — HALCO® Type 1 Molded Hook with HALCO® Knit Nylon Loop is the preferred low-profile pair. For softer-handed brace closures, HALCO® Soft Woven Hook is the preferred Velcro-brand-hook alternative.

Both C-loop and Z-loop are double-sided strap materials made by folding a knit fabric around a loop tape and stitching it. The fold geometry is the difference. C-loop folds the fabric in a “C” shape around a loop tape insert and is straight-stitched along the open edge, producing a strap with a soft outer face and a loop inner face. Z-loop folds the fabric in a “Z” shape into a true loop-on-both-sides construction and is zig-zag stitched, producing a strap that engages with hook on both faces. HALCO® C-Fold Loop is a C-loop construction; HALCO® Z-Fold Double-Face Loop is a Z-loop construction.

Patient positioning straps are engaged and disengaged hundreds of times per day under load, so the dominant requirement is cycle life. HALCO® Type 4 Molded Hook delivers superior peel and shear strength and is the preferred hook component for patient positioning. It engages best with HALCO® Unnapped Loop, which resists lint, fuzzing, and shed-out over thousands of cycles. For positioning straps that need to flex around contoured patient anatomy, a sewn assembly with woven elastic loop sections can be added.

Tricot is a warp-knit fabric construction with a soft, smooth face and a slight stretch. In orthopedic hook and loop, “tricot backing” is used in two ways. First, as a comfort backing on hook tape or strap tips, so the back of the hook component sits against skin or skin-adjacent fabric without irritation. Second, as a fabric used to laminate loop to a soft foam (tricot foam UBL), creating a cushioned loop face for brace inner surfaces. Tricot backings let the brace designer combine the engagement performance of a high-shear hook or loop with an against-skin surface that is comfortable for long-wear applications.

Molded hook strap tips are die-cut pieces of plastic molded hook bonded to the engaging end of a fabric strap. They serve three functions: (1) they protect the loop face from snagging on the raw fabric edge of the strap, which extends loop life; (2) they give the strap a defined, rigid engaging surface that aligns cleanly against the loop face every time the brace is closed; and (3) they can be branded with the manufacturer’s logo or color, supporting product identity. Halco fabricates molded hook strap tips from Type 3 or Type 4 hook to the customer’s part drawing, with adhesive lamination, mounting holes, or sewn-on tab options available.

Both. Halco fabricates hook and loop strap parts using sewing (straight-stitch and zig-zag) and welding (thermal and ultrasonic), selected to fit the substrate, production volume, and finished appearance the OEM specifies. Sewn assemblies are common for fabric-faced brace straps; welded assemblies are common for higher-volume runs and cleaner-edge constructions. Custom strap-face printing — brand name, OEM logo, model identifier, sizing markers, or alignment indicators — is available as part of the converting process and is commonly added to brace and patient-care straps where the strap face is visible to the patient or clinician.

Typically not. Halco supplies specialty hook and loop engineered for the cycle life, peel and shear strength, and skin-adjacent comfort that orthopedic braces, prosthetic interfaces, and patient positioning and transport straps require — without the cost of medical-grade or biocompatibility-tested materials these applications don’t typically need. Halco operates under an ISO 13485 (2016) certified quality management system alongside ISO 9001 (2015), so manufacturers get medical-device-grade quality rigor whether or not the application calls for medical-grade materials.

A range of 3M pressure-sensitive adhesives is available for custom lamination of multi-layer laminates in orthopedic and patient care assemblies. Halco’s 3M Preferred Converter status gives the OEM access to the adhesive chemistry, surface-energy match, and service-environment performance the application requires. Medical-grade adhesives are also available for skin contact applications, which is uncommon in orthopedic brace construction.

Halco’s four double-sided products — HALCO® Double-Sided Woven Hook, HALCO® Double-Sided Woven Loop, HALCO® Double-Sided Molded Hook, and HALCO® Double-Sided Knit Loop — function as spacers between two engaging faces in orthopedic and patient-care devices. Each product carries hook on both sides (or loop on both sides) so it can engage with mating material on either face. The most common use case is adjustable positioning: a cold or heat therapy wrap, brace, or prosthetic interface can be lengthened or shortened by repositioning where each face of the spacer engages with its mating closure, eliminating the need for multiple sized devices. Spacer choice depends on the engagement surfaces on the device, the skin-contact requirement, and the closure cycle life required.

Yes. Standard widths run from 1/2″ to 12″ on most molded hook and loop tape products, with custom widths available. Color can be dyed-to-match any Pantone reference for brace OEMs that want strap components in their brand color or in a patient-recognizable color code. Die-cut shapes — strap tips, brace closure pads, cuff inserts — are produced to the customer’s part drawing in medium- and high-volume runs.