Ginning and Bale-making Machine: A cotton gin is a machine that quickly and easily separates the cotton fibers

from the seeds, a job formerly performed by hand. The fibers are processed into cotton goods, and the seeds may be used to grow more cotton, to produce cottonseed oil, or, if they are badly damaged, are disposed of. The gin uses a combination of a wire screen and small wire hooks to pull the cotton through, while brushes continuously remove the loose cotton lint to prevent jams. The Gin uses six or seven rotating spiked cylinders to break up large clumps of cotton. Finer foreign material such as dirt and leaves passes through rods or screens for removal. The stick machine uses centrifugal force to remove large foreign matter such as sticks and burrs while the cotton is held by rapidly rotating saw cylinders. The gin stand uses the teeth of rotating saws to pull the cotton through a series of "ginning ribs", which pull the fibers from the seeds which are too small to pass through the ribs. The bale press then compresses the cotton into bales for storage and shipping.

Opening and Cleaning Machine: A spinning mill employs a number of processes to convert the fibres into yarn or thread. These processes contrive to clean the fibres, straighten and align them, and then bind them together as a strand by means of twist. The processes which contribute to achieve this are, firstly, opening and cleaning, during which the large agglomerations of ginned cotton fibre are reduced in size to small tufts. The impurities are removed by a combination of mechanical and pneumatic methods. A cleaning machine consists of a large cylindrical drum with a central cylinder havig rows of serrated teeth onto which the cotton fibres cling to when the entire setup moves at a high speed. The small impurities that are left over after the ginning process are removed as they do not cling to the teeth and are thrown out by centrifugal force.

Blending Machine: Simultaneously, blending may take place during which batches of fibres from a number of similar types of bale are mixed together. Blending serves to minimise the effect on the raw material of slight variations between the bales; this commonly occurs with natural fibres such as cotton. The cotton blending machines are large drums that a mounted about their length in the horizontal position. These drums have about 4 to 6 hands that spin in the direction opposite to the drum and assist in the mixing of different batches of cotton. This process is carried out only if there are variations in the quality of the raw cotton.

Carding Machine: Carding is a mechanical process that breaks up locks and unorganized clumps of fibre and then aligns the individual fibres so that they are more or less parallel with each other. It is necessary to separate the fibres from each other and to remove as much as possible of the remaining impurities. This is achieved by passing the fibres between closely spaced surfaces clothed with opposing sharp wire teeth in a process known as carding. The fibres are assembled into a loose strand (sliver or tow) at the conclusion of this stage. Carding is a mechanical process that breaks up locks and unorganised clumps of fibre and then aligns the individual fibres so that they are more or less parallel with each other. There are many types of carding machines but only 2 of them are commonly used, they are y y Drum Carding Machine Cottage Carding Machine

Drum Carding Machine: Most drum carders are hand-cranked but some are powered by electric motor. These machines generally have two rollers, or drums, covered with card clothing. The licker-in, or smaller roller meters fibre from the infeed tray onto the larger storage drum. The two rollers are connected to each other by a belt- or chain-drive so that the their relative speeds cause the storage drum to gently pull fibres from the licker-in. This pulling straightens the fibres and lays them between the wire pins of the storage drum's card cloth. Fibre is added until the storage drum's card cloth is full. A gap in the card cloth facilitates removal of the batt when the card cloth is full. Some drum carders have a soft-bristled brush attachment that presses the fibre into the storage drum. This attachment serves to condense the fibres already in the card cloth and adds a small amount of additional straightening to the condensed fibre.

Cottage Carding Machine: Cottage and commercial carding machines differ significantly from the simple drum card. These carders do not store fibre in the card cloth as the drum carder does but, rather, fibre passes through the workings of the carder for storage or for additional processing by other machines. A typical cottage carder has a single large drum (the swift) accompanied by a pair of in-feed rollers (nippers), one or more pairs of worker and stripper rollers, a fancy, and a doffer. In-feed to the carder is usually accomplished by hand or by conveyor belt and often the output of the cottage carder is stored as a batt or further processed into roving and wound into bumps with an accessory bump winder. Raw fibre, placed on the in-feed table or conveyor is moved to the nippers which restrain and meter the fibre onto the swift. As they are transferred to the swift, many of the fibres are straightened and laid into the swift's card cloth. These fibres will be carried past the worker / stripper rollers to the fancy.

As the swift carries the fibres forward, from the nippers, those fibres that are not yet straightened are picked up by a worker and carried over the top to its paired stripper. Relative to the surface speed of the swift, the worker turns quite slowly. This has the effect of reversing the fibre. The stripper, which turns at a higher speed than the worker, pulls fibres from the worker and passes them to the swift. The stripper's relative surface speed is slower than the swift's so the swift pulls the fibres from the stripper for additional straightening.

Straightened fibres are carried by the swift to the fancy. The fancy's card cloth is designed to engage with the swift's card cloth so that the fibres are lifted to the tips of the swift's card cloth and carried by the swift to the doffer. The fancy and the swift are the only rollers in the carding process that actually touch. The slowly turning doffer removes the fibres from the swift and carries them to the fly comb where they are stripped from the doffer. A fine web of more or less parallel fibre, a few fibres thick and as wide as the carder's rollers, exits the carder at the fly comb by gravity or other mechanical means for storage or further processing.
Drawing Machine: The fibrous tows or slivers are drawn by passing them between a series of pairs of rollers having progressively increasing circumferential velocity. During drawing, the fibres are made to slide past each other in a controlled way such that the inter-fibre friction straightens them. This aligns the fibres approximately parallel to each other and causes them to overlap, randomly, along the length of the strand to preserve its coherence.

Combing Machine: The comb machines used have long metal teeth, and only barely resemble the comb used on hair. However, they are used in a similar fashion with one comb holding the fibre while the other is moved through, slowly transferring the fibre to the moving comb. Combing the fibres removes the short fibres and arranges the fibre in a flat bundle, with all the fibres going the same direction. This preparation is commonly used to spin a worsted yarn. Woolen yarns cannot be spun from fibre prepared with combs, instead the fibre must be carded. Cotton is combed when it is to be used for quality fabric with high thread counts. In general, combing is done with fibres that are longer, and carding with fibres of a shorter length.

Spinning Machine: During spinning, the strand of cotton is reduced in thickness in preparation for the final conversion of the fibres into yarn form. This process reduces the strand thickness to the required level, binds the fibres together with twist and winds the yarn onto a suitable package or bobbin. This is achieved by pulling the fibre through multiple rollers under tension.

The spinning machines take the roving, thins it and twists it, creating yarn which it winds onto a bobbin. In mule spinning the roving is pulled off a bobbin and fed through some rollers, which are feeding at several different speeds. This thins the roving at a consistent rate. If the roving was not a consistent size, then this step could cause a break in the yarn, or could jam the machine. The yarn is twisted through the spinning of the bobbin as the carriage moves out, and is rolled onto a cop as the carriage returns. Checking Machine: In this machine each of the bobbins is rewound to give a tighter bobbin. Folding and twisting: Plying is done by pulling yarn from two or more bobbins and twisting it together, in the opposite direction that in which it was spun. Depending on the weight desired, the cotton may or may not be plied, and the number of strands twisted together varies.
Gassing Machine: Gassing is the process of passing yarn, as distinct from fabric very rapidly through a series of Bunsen gas flames in a gassing frame, in order to burn off the projecting fibres and make the thread round and smooth and also brighter. Only the better qualities of yarn are gassed. Cotton Weaving Machine: In general, weaving involves the interlacing of two sets of threads at right angles to each other: the warp and the weft (older woof). The warp threads are held taut and in parallel order, typically by means of a loom, though some forms of weaving may use other methods. The loom is warped (or dressed) with the warp threads passing through heddles on two or more harnesses. The warp threads are moved up or down by the harnesses creating a space called the shed. The weft thread is wound onto spools called bobbins. The bobbins are placed in a shuttle that carries the weft thread through the shed. Power Loom: The basic mechanisms in any type of looms can be classified into Primary (shedding, picking & beat up), secondary and Auxiliary motions. Shedding opens the warp sheet into layers. The picking causes the shuttle carrying weft to be propelled from one end of the loom to another. The beat up motion lays the previously laid weft to the fell of the cloth. The secondary motion comprise of take up and let off motions. The auxiliary motions consist of the warp stop, weft stop and warp protector motions.

Looms can be classified as follows depending on whether they use a shuttle or not and the method used to insert the weft yarn. Loom type Looms with shuttles Method of inserting weft yarn The weft yarn is inserted through the back-and-forth motion of the shuttle. Characteristics Great all purpose loom. Vibration and noise are severe problems and high speed operation is difficult. A very versatile loom, but it is noisy and there is a limit to its operation at high speed.

Gripper A small metal gripper shuttle grasps the loom weft yarn and inserts it.

Looms without shuttles

Two bands at the center of the fabric receive and pass on the weft yarn. The A very versatile loom, but it is Rapier catch method is the most popular method, noisy and there is a limit to its loom and is further broken down into two operation at high speed. types, the band method and the pole method. High speed operation is possible. Since water is used only filament Water A jet of water is used to insert the weft yarns (synthetic fabrics) can be jet loom yarn. woven. High speed operation is possible. Air jet At present this is the most A jet of air is used to insert the weft yarn. loom popular type of loom and its functions are excellent overall.

Classification of Looms:

The basic mechanisms in any type of loom can be classified as follows:

y y y

Primary motions Secondary motions, and Auxiliary motions.

The primary motions can further be divided as shedding, picking and beat up motions. The shedding opens the warp sheet into layers to facilitate passage of shuttle. The picking motion causes the shuttle carrying weft to be propelled from one end of loom to another. The beat up motion lays the previously laid weft to the fell of the cloth.

The secondary motions comprise of take up and let off motions. The take up motion helps to wind the cloth on to the cloth roller and also influences the pick density in the cloth. The let off motion helps to let the warp from the weavers beam at an uniform rate thus maintaining the warp tension constant throughout the weaving process. The auxiliary motions consist of the warp stop motion, weft stop motion and warp protector motion. The warp stop motion is used to stop the loom in the event of warp breakages. This is necessary to prevent fabric defects such as missing ends and floats. The weft stop motion is used to stop the loom in the event of weft exhaustion or weft breakages. This is necessary to prevent missing weft threads called cracks, in the fabric. The warp protector is used to prevent multiple warp thread breakages in the event of shuttle getting trapped in the middle of the warp sheet.