ABSTRACT

The ginning and carding processes are designed to enhance fiber uniformity and degree of orientation in addition to removing trashes and foreign matters for the production of yarn. However, these processes also damage the fibers during the processing and lower the quality of the fibers. In addition these negative effects of processing conditions may be reflected by the morphological characteristics of fibers unraveled from yarns in T-shirts produced by the conditions.

While the qualities of the resulting yarns, fabrics, and garments are adversely affected by various processing conditions, the extent of the damage, in regard to the fiber properties, has not been well quantified by scientific means. This research was designed to elucidate the effects of ginning and carding processes on the fiber quality by applying two ginning rates, two lint cleaner systems, and two carding rates.

T-shirts produced by various processing conditions were washed and dried for 32 cycles by a commercial washer/dryer. The dimensional properties were measured and three T-shirts having different amount of shrinkage were picked. Tensile and morphological properties of fibers in selected T-shirts were measured and analyzed statistically. The T-shirt produced with cotton undergone high ginning rate, 2 lint cleaners, and high carding rate showed the least amount of shrinkage during repeated washing/drying. However, this T-shirt showed the lowest average values of breaking strength and breaking elongation of fibers. We could see that the number of lint cleaners had negative effect of fiber tensile properties. Fiber tensile properties from card slivers corresponding to the selected three T-shirts did not show definite effects of any processing variables considered. However, from card sliver to T-shirt, fiber tensile properties were decreased significantly. Especially, the decrease of the mean and the variance of the breaking elongation were quite noticeable.

The differences in the surface characteristics of fibers from T-shirts undergone repeated washing/drying were also seen by the scanning electron microscope. Fibers undergone high ginning rate, 2 lint cleaners, and high carding rate had more loose fibrils on fibers and more loose fibers on fabric surfaces.