Summer Textile

Internship

Technocraft Industries India Limited

Raj Shanker Chaurasia

Suraj Kedia
Technocraft Industries Pvt. Ltd.
 The multi dimensional group “TECHNOCRAFT
INDUSTRIES (INDIA) LIMITED” established in the year
1972 by a group of technologists with the aim of
manufacturing highly sophisticated engineering products.
 The Technocraft group enjoys a good position in five main
business industries viz., Drum Closures, Pipes and Tubes,
Engineering Services, Scaffolding Systems and accessories
and Cotton Yarn.
 Their head office is located in Mumbai (India) & overseas
offices & Warehouses in Manchester (U.K.), Lodz (Poland)
& Budapest (Hungary); Chicago (U.S.A.) & Houston,
Hilden (Germany), China, Australia.
Company Objective
 On the textiles front, Technocraft envisions to be one of
the leading cotton yarn producers in India and one of the
largest fully integrated textile producers in the country.
COMPETITIVE STRENGTHS OF THE
COMPANY
• In house capability to design and manufacture special purpose
machines, tools, accessories and development process, thereby
resulting in world class manufacturing at low costs.
• High technological base in its manufacturing units, which results
in optimum raw material utilization.
• Exports to over 60 countries and covering all the continents
(except Antartica)
• Located close to Mumbai, there is abundant availability of cheap
and skilled labour.
• Manufacturing units are located close to JNPT port, which
results in very low shipping costs.
• The installation of a Captive Power Plant in the Textile division
has resulted in lower cost of power.
• Efficient and modern effluent treatment plant with recycling of
water.
 COMPETITION
 In the domestic market they face competition from both the
organised and unorganised sectors. Even with a diversified
product portfolio, quality approach, manufacturing flexibility
and modern technology they face intense competitive
pressures. Countries such as Mexico have the advantage of
being located in proximity to our main markets of the US and
EU. These countries can shorten the lead time required by
being able to deliver products to the customers in shorter
time. They also face competition from manufacturers in other
cost efficient supplier countries, which have low labour costs.
They intend to meet this competition through product
differentiation, whereby they offer value added, design based
products in the respective segments.
ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE -
DEPARTMENTS
There are 5 departments in the unit :
 Raw material department – This department is
responsible for the sourcing and storage of raw
material(i.e. cotton).
 Production department – The department takes care of
all the production related activities from planning to
processing.
 Maintenance department – This department takes care of
all the machinery and cleanses the machinery at regular
intervals.
 Quality Assurance department – The department is
responsible for checking the quality levels and maintaining
them throughout the process.
 Human Resource department – They take care of all the
working personnel of the factory from a machine
operator to the manager.
Spinning
 Spinning is the most important and the initial step in the
manufacturing of fabric. It is the twisting together of
drawn out strands of fibres to form yarn. The object of
spinning is to transform the single fibres into a cohesive
and workable continuous length yarn. Basically, in the case
of natural fibres, the process involves opening, blending,
carding, drawing, combing and roving to produce the yarn.
PROCESS FLOW
Raw Material Storage and Inspection
 The quality and quantity of the raw material being used is
what determines the type of yarn that will be produced.
The raw material which is being used here are short
staple fibres of cotton which are sourced in the form of
bales.
 Once the delivery of the raw material arrives, 25%
sampling of the lot is done for the inspection process. 2
bales are opened completely and 100% inspection is
carried out.
The raw material that comes in is inspected for the following
criteria:
1) Moisture Content
The moisture content is evaluated using a moisture meter (Ray
Lit). A pair of tongs like device is inserted into the bales of
cotton. The meter connected to it shows the moisture
content.
Acceptable value: 8 %
2) Reflection/Deflection and B Value
The RD value gives the whiteness of the raw cotton while the B
value gives the yellowness.
Name of the machine used: Uster HVI
Acceptable values: RD Value- 72-80%
B Value- 1-10%
3) Length
Length of the fibres is assessed by feeding combed raw
cotton into the machine.
Name of the machine used: Uster AFIS Pro
4) Micronaire and Mass
Range of accepted micronaire: 3.7-4.3
Accepted mass: 8.5 – 11.5 gms
5) Neps and Maturity
Name of the machine used: Uster Tester 4S
Blow Room
 With all harvesting methods, however, the cotton seed,
together with the fibers, always gets into the ginning plant
where it is broken up into trash and seed-coat fragments.
This means that ginned cotton is always contaminated
with trash and dust particles and that an intensive
cleaning is only possible in the spinning mill.
 Input: Bales of raw cotton
 Output: Cleaned and homogenously mixed cotton in the
form of lap form or chute feed to the card
 Following processes take place in the blow room:
• Pre opening
• Pre cleaning
• Mixing or blending
• Fine opening
• De-dusting
PRE OPENING
 Effective preopening results in smaller tuft sizes, thus
creating a large surface area for easy and efficient removal
of trash particles by the fine openers.
 This is done by two machines namely- bale opener and
bale plucker.
PRE CLEANING
 In the pre cleaning process, seeds of cotton are removed
with the help of cylinders and beaters present inside the
machine.
 The number of beaters and cylinders depends upon the
quality of cotton required.
 In addition to this, the machine also contains metal
detectors which restrict the entry of any ferrous or
nonferrous impurities.
MIXING OR BLENDING
 Barre or streakiness is due to uneven mixing of different
cottons. Hence mixing technology is a decisive factor in
spinning mill technology
 Bigger the differences of cotton parameters like fineness,
color and staple length, the greater the importance of
mixing
FINE CLEANING
 The beater in fine cleaners thoroughly opens the fiber
material and transports it to the next stage by suction,
while the trash is also removed by the beating and
opening action.
Dedusting
 Helps in removing micro dust or dedusting the fibre
material.
CARDING
 The carding is a one of the most important process of
the short staple spinning system. Carding is an
operation where the tufty condition of the fibres is
converted into an individual fibre form. The
separation of fibres in individual form is one
fundamental operation of carding while the other
fundamental operation is the formation of the card
sliver.
 Input: Uniform Lap feed from blowroom
 Output: Carded Sliver
DRAWING
 In order to produce a strong and uniform yarn it is
necessary to straighten and align the fibres and to
improve the evenness of the sliver. All of these objectives
are achieved by the drawing process carried out by a
machine called as the draw frame. At the draw frame a
number of card slivers are drawn or stretched
between several pairs of rollers. As the fibres are
attenuated or drafted, the fibres are straightened and
aligned to the axis of the sliver in the direction in which
they are drawn.
Draw Frame:
Input: Sliver
Output: Regular Sliver
Finisher Draw Frame:
Input: Combed Sliver
Output: Regular Sliver
LAP FORMATION
 The raw material delivered by the carding machine cannot
be fed directly to the comber. Lap preparation is a must.
 Input: Regular Sliver
 Output: Lap
COMBING
 Combing is an optional process in the processing of short
staple fibres necessary for the preparation of high quality
combed yarn. The process of combing is carried out after
carding and the combed sliver after passing through the
draw frame follows the regular path of yarn formation.
 Input: Lap
 Output: Combed Sliver
SPEED FRAME
 The drawn sliver is composed of clean and straightened fibres
lying parallel to one another and to the axis of the sliver. These
characteristics of a drawn sliver are ideal for creation of a yarn.
However this is not possible because if the drawn sliver is to
be directly converted into a yarn it would require a mechanical
draft of a range of 300 to 600. But even on the most modern
machines technologically it is not possible construct a ring
frame that could give such high drafts in a single process. So
an intermediate stage of drafting is carried out using the
roving frame. The draft given at the roving frame reduces the
linear density of the drawn sliver into a less thick strand of
fibres suitable as an input to the ring frame. This roving which
is fed to the ring frame can then be easily converted into a
yarn by giving a draft of 15 to 40.
 Input: Uniform sliver/drawn sliver
 Output: Roving
RING FRAME
 The ring spinning is the final operation in the formation of
the ring spun yarn. The basic purpose of the ring spinning
frame is to attenuate the roving until the required
fineness of the yarn is achieved.
 The initial and maintenance cost of the ring spinning
is quite high. The ring frame contributes about 60%
towards the final cost of production of the yarn. So every
effort is being put in to make modify the ring spinning
machine to give more productivity at a less cost.
 Input: Roving
 Output:Yarn
WINDING
 The quantity of yarn on the ring spinning bobbins
or cops is very small as compared to the size of
the package required for efficient processing at the
knitting and weaving process. In addition to the small
package size, the ring bobbins are also full of spinning
defects i.e. thick and thin places. So the process of
winding involves unwinding of the yarn from the
spinning packages i.e. ring bobbins and winding it on to a
new bigger package. During the formation of the new
package, spinning faults i.e. thick and thin places are also
removed.
 Inputs:Yarn
 Outputs:Yarn on cone
CONDITIONING
 Conditioning plays a major role in determining both
knitting and weaving performance of the yarn.
 The normal moisture content of cotton is around 6-6.5%.
After converting to yarn, cotton has only 4% of moisture.
A conditioning machine by the name of imparts required
amount of moisture and strength to the yarns. It uses
steam, high temperature and pressure.
INSPECTION
 Before the final packaging of the yarns .It is being sent for
inspection in the quality assurance department.
 A sample of yarn is subjected to various tests depending
on its usage and its end requirement.
 The various parameters on which the yarn is tested are:
1) Yarn Strength (Uster Classimat 3)
2) Twist per inch (UT4)
3) Yarn Count ( HVI-900)
4) Hairiness, thickness, thinness, slubs (Uster AFIS)
5) Inspection under UV light
PACKAGING
 After yarn conditioning and UV checking, the cones which
pass proceed to be packed in order to be sent on for
delivery. The packing and transferring data is fed
simultaneously into the computer as processes occur. The
packaged material is then stacked into the storage, from
where it is loaded onto trucks to be taken for shipping
out.
KNITTING
 The term knitting describes the technique of constructing
textile structures by forming a continuous length of yarn
into columns of vertically intermeshed loops.
Types of Knit
 Weft knit- The interloop links two consecutive loops
placed horizontally; when one loop breaks, the entire
fabric can be undone simply by pulling the free end of the
yarn.
 Warp knit- The yarn is knitted vertically or diagonally
and loops are formed accordingly; to knit the fabric, it is
necessary to use many threads simultaneously, allowing
the loops formed by the different threads to bind
together.
WEFT KNITTING MACHINES
Weft Knitting Machines can be broadly can be broadly
grouped into:
a) Circular machines
b) Flatbed machines
c) V bed machines
Here at Technocraft, circular machines and V bed machines
are in use.
CIRCULAR MACHINES
 Knitting elements such as needles, sinkers, cylinders, cams
ad feeders are supported at the centre called as knitting
zone.Yarn packages are mounted at the overhead creels
and yarns are fed to knitting zone thro yarn guides, stop
motions and feeders. Knitted fabric goes down inside the
cylinder towards the centre of the m/c, drawn into the
take down device and finally collected on a roll winding
mechanism. Fabric spreader gradually converts the
tubular fabric into a double layer folded fabric by
preventing the formation of pleats or creases.
V-BED Knitting Machine
 The modern V bed knitting machine is a highly engineered,
fully automated, electronically controlled, precision
knitting machine.
 On a v bed machine the two needle beds are arranged in
a V’ configuration.
 The Interaction between yarn and the knitting elements
that create the fabric occur at the apex of the V and the
fabric moves downward between the two beds drawn by
the take down system.
INSPECTION
 The fabric is inspected for the following defects:
 Yarn Faults
1. Slubs
2. Contamination
3. Thick/thin lines
4. Patta
 Knitting Faults
5. Knitting Fly
6. Holes (mendable)
7. Holes (non-mendable)
8. Cutup/Pressoff
9. Needle line
10. Miss loop
11. Lycra jumps/line
12. Oil stains
13. Oil line
14. Circular oil lines
DYEING
 The wet processing sector of the textile covers all the
processes on textiles that involve some form of wet or
chemical treatment. Wet Processing can be done by two
methods; batch or continuous. Here at Technocraft, batch
processing takes place.
 Batch Processing : The total amount of textile is
processed at the same time in a suitable machine. Each
load of material is a batch and the next batch cannot be
started until the first batch is completed and removed.
 The wet processing sector can be divided into three main
parts:
a) Preparation Process
b) Coloration Process
c) Finishing Process
PROCESS FLOW
1. Preparation of Lab Dip
The company receives orders from various buyers along
with a sample and specifications of the type of shade
and fabric required. The first step is to make a lab dip
for the order. This means that a sample has to be
prepared in the lab first, before going for bulk
production.
2. Sourcing of fabric
The fabric which has to be dyed is either produced in-
house or is outsourced, according to the requirements.
Here at Technocraft, rib and single jersey can be
produced in the knitting department. All other types of
fabrics are outsourced from various suppliers according
to the need.
3. Inspection
The fabric is inspected for various factors and defects
that may be present.
4. Conversion of fabric into rope form
The fabric which has to be dyed is usually in the form of
a roll or is packaged. It has to be converted into rope
form in order to facilitate the feeding of the fabric into
the RFD (Ready for Dyeing) machine.
5. Pre – treatment process
The fabric to be processed is made fit for dyeing.
6. Dyeing
The fabric to be dyed is now subjected to various
chemicals and colouring agents. The dyes being used
here are Reactive Dyes. The chemicals used are
sequesting agents, levelling agents, lubricants and dye
bath conditioners.
7. Squeezer
After the fabric is unloaded from the machine, it is fed
into another machine called the squeezer. The fabric is
squeezed between a pair of rollers to drain out the
excess of water which may be present in the fabric after
the dyeing process gets completed.
8. Dryer
Once the squeezing has been done the fabric is passed
through the dryer in which a high temperature is
maintained so that the fabric does not have any more
moisture
9. Compacter
In this process the fabric is passed through cylindrical
rollers and jets of steam is applied on the fabric to
modify its urge or width of the fabric and make it fuller.
The GSM of the fabric is also determined in this
machine depending on the speed of the cylinders
present in compacter.
10. Inspection
The final fabric that comes out from the compacter
before being packaged is inspected for various defects
that may have crept into the fabric during various
processing stages. The fabric is inspected as per the 4
point inspection system. These may be yarn defects,
knitting defects or dyeing defects.
11. Fastness Test
 Wash fastness
 Rub fastness
12. Packaging
The approved fabric which has no defects and
imperfections is sent for packaging. The fabric is packaged
according to the buyer’s requirements. The fabric is now
either sent to the buyer or is sent to the stitching line as
per the order
REFERENCE
 Technocraft operation mannual
 www.technocraftgroup.com
 Textileeducationtips.blogspot.com
 Textilelearner.blogspot.com
 Textilelearner.com