TMAS members gear up for ITMA ASIA
08/10/2024
Many leading brands are now looking for the incorporation of even higher percentages of recycled fibre into the yarns that their products are made from.
TMAS secretary general Therese Premler-Andersson said: “Many Chinese cotton spinning companies have been processing yarn mill waste for decades using rotor spinning technology, which is best suited for recycled yarns that contain a high short-fibre content.
“In the past, the practice of incorporating a percentage of recycled content into yarn blends has not been anything to do with meeting sustainability goals, but simply about achieving an acceptable quality with the cheapest available fibres. Now, however, these mills are in the position of potentially being able to charge a premium for yarns containing higher recycled content.”
According to the Zurich-based International Textile Machinery Association (ITMA), China has installed just under four million new rotor spinning spindles since 2015. The potential is huge and this industry-wide development puts high demands on changing and adopting production with upgraded technologies not only in spinning, but also further up the production chain.
The subsequent weaving of yarns with recycled content requires special consideration. TMAS member Eltex’s ACT-R is a stand-alone device designed to automatically keep weft yarn tension at a constant and required value on rapier weaving machines.
“This is especially important when weaving with recycled yarns because the quality of the yarn packages can be much more irregular,” says Eltex senior sales engineer Daniel Sauret. “Shorter staple fibres result in inconsistencies and are prone to breakages, but the ACT-R system automatically compensates for any differences in weft yarn tension that may originate from such irregularities, regardless of whether the yarn package is full or almost empty.”
The ACT-R is designed to be fitted after the prewinder, and can be used on any type of rapier machine.
Advanced weaving control is also the bedrock of business for Vandewiele Sweden, which benefits from all of the synergies and accumulated know-how in fabric formation of the textile machinery builder Vandewiele Group.
The company supplies its weft yarn feeding and tension control units for weaving looms to weaving machine manufacturers around the world, as well as for retrofitting in working mills, and will present its latest X4 yarn feeders with integrated accessory displays at ITMA ASIA + CITME 2024.
TMAS member Baldwin’s TexCoat G4 precisely applies chemistry, including softeners, antimicrobials, durable water repellents, flame retardants, resins and most other water-based chemicals across a textile’s surface only where it is required, on one or both sides of the fabric. Baldwin already has multiple installations in China adding fluorocarbon-free durable water repellents to technical fabrics, including one in partnership with a major European sporting goods retailer.
It has recently announced a collaboration with Monforts, a Germany-based provider dyeing and finishing equipment, and chemicals group Archroma for its fluorocarbon-free durable water repellent finishes. A full-width Baldwin TexCoat digital spray unit is currently being installed on a stenter frame at the Monforts Advanced Technology Centre in Mönchengladbach, Germany, to enable extensive trials to be carried out on an industrial scale.
“We strongly believe that this partnership will be greater than the sum of its parts,” says Rick Stanford, Baldwin’s vice-president of business development for textiles. “This is the first time our three companies have committed to working together with a focus on bringing transformative change to the dyeing and finishing space. It will result in significantly lower energy, chemical and water consumption with increased productivity and higher quality for fabric finishers.”
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