Common Faults Found in Woven Fabrics and Their Causes

Common Faults Found in Woven Fabrics and Their Causes

Noor Ahmed Raaz
Specialized in Apparel Manufacturing
Owner and Editor in Chief Textile Merchandising
Asst. Prof., Department of Textile Engineering
Atish Dipankar University of Science & Technology
Email: textilemerchandising1@gmail.com

 

 

Woven Fabrics:

In general words, we can say that woven fabrics are the structural combination of warp and weft yarn. Here, warp and weft yarn combinations can be changed according to the fabric structure. There are different types of woven fabric such as plain, twill, stain, basket, leno, mock leno ,etc. Today, I would like to discuss an important topic about woven fabric which is the different faults of woven fabrics in the fabric manufacturing process.

Different Faults of Woven Fabrics:

There are different types of problems founds during the weaving fabric manufacturing process. Not only that, also found few faults after production.

Let’s see the most common faults of woven fabric and their remedies as follows-

1. Bar
2. Box mark
3. Broken pattern
4. Broken pick
5. Cracks
6. Cut weft
7. Defective selvedges
8. Floats stitches
9. Fuzzy
10. Hang pick
11. Missing ends /ends out
12. Reed marks
13. Shuttle marks
14. Stains
15. Uneven cloth

1. Bar:

It is a band running across the full width of cloth due to the difference in appearance from its adjacent surface. This term covers a number of specific faults as below-

• Pick bar-due to difference in pick spacing.
• Starting mark-due to restarting weaving after unweaving, pick finding, prolonged loom stoppage etc.
• Tension bar/shiner-due to difference in weft tensions.
• Weft bar-due to difference in material count, twist, luster. Color or shade of adjacent groups of weft yarns.

2. Box mark:

Box mark is a width wise fine line showing stained or injured weft due to the rubbing of shuttle when it rebounds. The causes of box marks are-

• Dirty box
• Shuttle riding over the weft
• Dirty shuttle
• Weft flying about too freely
• Dirty picking sticks

3. Broken pattern:

This defect may be due to the wrong drawing of threads, inserting of the pick in the wrong shed, incorrect lifting of warp threads etc.

4. Broken pick:

A pick missing from a portion of the width of the fabric due to rough shuttle eyes, poor winding, weft yarn breakage, improper pirn insertion in the shuttle, etc.

5. Cracks:

It is a narrow streak along the weft due to pronounced openings between two adjacent yarns. A take-up motion, which is a sticking, may also produce a crack in the fabric.

6. Cut weft:

This defect is caused by using weak weft with a strong warp. It shows as a pinhole.

7. Defective selvedges:

There may be various types of defective selvedges –

• Curled selvedge due to incorrect balance of cloth structures between body and selv
• Cut selvedges- due to selvedge sticking to the emery cloth.
• Loppy selvedges- due to selvedge ends have worn.
• Pulled in selvedges due to isolated tight picks.
• Slack selvedges- due to tension variation between body and selvedges.
• Tight selvedges- due to incorrect balance of structure between the body and the selvedges.
• Uneven selvedges- due to variation in weft tension.
  

  Defective selvedges

8. Floats stitches:

A place where warp and weft yarns escape the required interlacement. The main causes are entanglements in warp and weft threads, improper warp stop motion, static electricity generation, etc.

9. Fuzzy:

This is the fibrous appearance of the cloth due to presence of hairy or abraded yarns.

10. Hang pick:

A pick which is out of line for a short distance producing a triangular shaped hole in the fabric. It is caused by too early shedding or too light weft tension.

11. Missing ends /ends out:

The most common end is characterized by a gap of one or more warp ends in the fabric.

12. Reed marks:

Due to this fault, cloth shows irregular spacing between groups of warp yarns across the fabric width. The defect may be caused by damaged or defective reed or too late shedding.

13. Shuttle marks:

Width way marks due to abrasion of warp yarns by the shuttle.

14. Stains:

Stains are major problems on woven fabric. Oil, grease, dust, soil, carbon particles in the air, etc, may cause stains. Most of the stains are caused by poor material handling and carelessness of the workers. Certain stains can be removed by solvents.

15. Uneven cloth:

Consistent diameters of weft can produce shady cloth, which also occurs when the take-up motion is faulty. Broken ratchet wheel teeth may also produce faulty areas on fabric.