Abstract:
During fabric production, subsequent processes namely; spinning, weaving or knitting, wet processing and garmenting are followed, spinning process has the blow, carding, draw frame, combing (optional), speed frame and finally ring frame for formation of yam. carding is known to be the heart of spinning since a fault in the carding process affects yarn quality, The purpose
of carding is to individualize fibres, eliminate impurities, reduce neps, eliminate of dust, and short. fibres, blend fibres, orientate fibres and finally sliver formation.
on 17th January 2013; Busitema University textile laboratory received various machines from WAGATECH UK under the MSI Textile Engineering Project. Among these machines is a mini card (code 337A). This mini carding machine does not perform all the functions of carding; it is limited to web formation thus misses out on the formation of card sliver The sliver is thus manually formed from the web by the machine operator using bands by folding. This makes the sliver formation process time consuming and exposes the sliver to numerous human errors related to foreign matter or imperfections formed during, folding. This project therefore provided a solution to the above problems by introducing a coiler mechanism to the machine which continuously forms carded sliver.
The drum originally used to collect the web became irrelevant because the web was to be condensed by the coiler mechanism into sliver thus no more need for web collection. Therefore, the drum was thus to be unscrewed off the machine together with its drive.
The components of the coiler mechanism were designed (basically size, shape and material selection), The components considered in this case included gears for motion transfer, shafts, bearings, feed plate, trumpet, calendar rollers, coiler tube, coiler plate, card can, turn (able and coiler post plus machine. frame. The whole coiler mechanism was drawn and assembled using solid edge and 3-D AutoCAD 2007 as the design tools.
However; the project was too big because the mechanism had so many components. Also, literature on specific design of so many textile machinery parts is rare hence basic mechanical engineering design considerations were made.
