DESC:COMPLETE SPECIFICATION

4. Description:

Title of the Invention:

[0001] A Method for Representing the Quality Deviations of Textile Materials Tested in a Textile Materials Tester

Field of the invention:

[0002] The present invention relates to the method of representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in an instrument used for testing various textile materials.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION:

[0003] The present application claims priority from the Provisional Application No. 201641039264 filed on 17th Nov 2016, the full disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

[0004] Textile materials testers such as Evenness testers used in spinning industry are meant for testing the evenness and other properties of yarns, slivers and roving materials. Many properties like Mass deviations, hairiness, and foreign fibres are measured in an evenness tester. All the process materials like Sliver, Roving, Ring Cop yarns, Cone yarns etc are tested in the evenness tester for ascertaining quality of textile materials. Similarly, tensile testers test various tensile properties like strength; elongation etc. in various process materials like Ring yarns, Cone yarns, Double yarns etc. Another example is cotton tester which tests various properties of cotton materials like length, neps etc.

[0005] Generally, the test results of various process materials tested by a textile testing instrument are available as reports to the user in various formats. Reports can be numerical or graphical. Usually reports are available for a sample of textile material tested.

[0006] A typical example of numerical report is the consolidation of required quality parameters for the tested sample of textile material as a numerical table with statistical details like Mean, Standard deviation etc.

[0007] Typical examples for graphical reports of textile materials tested include Mass diagram, spectrogram, histogram, variance length curve, stroke diagram, FE curve etc.

[0008] WO2014172796A1 explains the method of compiling and providing a global textile quality benchmark related to a plurality of textile materials of same type located at different locations. At least one piece of quality data is received for each of the plurality of textile materials via a global communications network. The received quality data are statistically processed so as to enable a cumulative frequency analysis. A result of the processing is stored as a global textile quality benchmark that can be transmitted via the global communications network. The resulting global textile quality benchmark is always up to date and increasingly comprehensive. This prior art explains the method of compiling information from plurality of textile materials tested at different locations.

[0009] CN104471388B provides methods for comparing the quality of elongate textile samples, values of at least one parameter of a first sample are determined. Densities of events in a field of events are determined for the samples; two density lines are plotted and compared. This prior art explains the method of comparing the quality of elongated textile materials in a graphical form.

[0010] The present invention provides a method for representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in an instrument used for testing various textile materials. The method includes measuring all properties of various textile materials used in the manufacturing process of a spinning mill, identifying the deviations of the measured values from the limits and arriving at an overall quality effectiveness value based on the deviations and representing the same diagrammatically.

OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION

[0011] The main object of the present invention is to provide a method for representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in an instrument used for testing various textile materials in a spinning mill.

[0012] Other objects of the invention will be apparent from the description of the invention herein below.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

[0013] Accordingly, the present invention relates to a method of representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in an instrument used for testing various textile materials in a spinning mill comprising the following steps:
setting the limits(4) for various quality parameters of the textile material (1) measured by the textile testing instrument;
testing the textile material (1) for various quality parameters and storing the results (3);
identifying the deviations of the results (3) from the set limits (4) and arriving a quality effectiveness value ( 5) and
representing the quality effectiveness value (5) based on the deviation numerically or graphically or in the combination of both.

[0014] In an aspect of the invention, the limits are set by the user or arrived statistically.

[0015] In certain aspects, the limits are set for one or more types of textile materials available in the spinning mill.

[0016] In another aspect of the invention, a weightage index is provided for various quality parameters for various types of textile materials which forms a part of calculating the deviation information.

[0017] In yet another aspect of the invention, the graphical or numerical or the combination of both of the quality effectiveness value is shown as a common representation for all types of textile materials or as individual representation for each type of textile material tested in the textile testing instrument.

[0018] In certain aspects of the invention, the textile testing instrument can be an evenness tester, a tensile tester, a twist tester, a fault classification system and / or a fibre testing instrument.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0019] The present invention is described in the detailed description and not by way of limitation, in the figures of the accompanying drawings, and in which

Figure 1 shows an example method for arriving at the Quality effectiveness value from the measurement results of a textile testing instrument.

Figure 2 shows the representation of Quality Effectiveness value in a circular path filled with value at the middle wherein the filling is proportional to the Quality effectiveness value arrived.

Figure 3 shows the representation of Quality Effectiveness value in a circular path filled with value at the middle for All departments in a textile mill commonly along with the representations for individual departments.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0020] For the better understanding of the object, technical solution and advantage of the present invention, the present invention will be further explained in detail with respect to embodiments and accompanying drawings below. It should be understood that the specific embodiments described herein only be used for explaining the present invention but not used to limit the present invention.

[0021] The present invention relates to a method for representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in an instrument used for testing various textile materials in a spinning mill comprising the following steps:
setting the limits(4) for various quality parameters of the textile material (1) measured by the textile testing instrument;
testing the textile material (1) for various quality parameters and storing the results (3);
identifying the deviations of the results (3) from the set limits (4) and arriving a quality effectiveness value ( 5) and
representing the quality effectiveness value (5) based on the deviation numerically or graphically or in the combination of both.

[0022] Evenness testers and other textile testing instruments today are meant for measuring the quality levels of various textile materials available in a spinning mill. For example, the evenness tester tests various process materials like card sliver, comber sliver, roving and yarn. Each process material will have a quality limit above which a quality deviation is alarming and affects the final yarn quality. In such cases, users generally monitor manually for any deviations or some evenness testers helps to identify deviations for each test result by comparing it with the set limits.

[0023] Usually, set limits are available for all process materials for various quality parameters. Also, the importance of set limits varies between process materials and parameters. For example, a parameter called “Thick +50/km” in yarn stage is very severe and highly important compared to other parameters in other process stages.

[0024] In such a case, it becomes difficult for the user to understand whether the quality is under control overall for all process materials or deviated in certain processes. Even in case of any deviations, corrective actions are initiated by the user manually by verifying the results and importance of the process. The present invention helps to arrive at a single resultant value called as Quality effectiveness which is arrived based on the actual test results of various process materials for various parameters and the set limits. Such a resultant value helps user to understand about the level of quality in the spinning mill.

[0025] In an embodiment of the present invention, as an example, the evenness tester measures various properties of textile materials like mass evenness, imperfections like thick places, thin places, neps, hairiness index, hair count, foreign fibres, linear density etc. Testing can be done for various process materials like yarn, sliver, roving etc. Each test material tested in the evenness tester has a limit and if any measured property deviates the limit then it is defined as an outlier. Likewise, for all the textile materials tested in the evenness tester, various limits are available for defining outliers and these limits and identifying outliers is done for all properties measured. Based on the outliers determined by comparing the measured results and the set limits, a resultant numerical value called quality effectiveness is calculated which indicates the overall quality effectiveness of the spinning mill. Similarly, as another example, a tensile tester measures various properties of textile materials like strength, elongation etc for various process materials like Ring yarn, Cone yarn, Double yarn etc. Here also, each material can be set with a limit for each property measured and outliers can be identified as explained above. A quality effectiveness can be arrived again for the properties measured by the tensile tester. Similar concept can be applied to a fibre testing instrument also.

[0026] In certain embodiments of the present invention, the limits set can be either user defined or arrived statistically. Similarly, limits can be individually set for one or more types of textile materials and various process materials available in the spinning mill which can be tested in the evenness tester or any other instruments.

[0027] In another embodiment of the present invention based on the limits set, the quality effectiveness is calculated as explained in the following table. The following table shows the consolidation of various quality properties tested in an evenness tester as an example for various process materials like Card sliver, Draw frame sliver, Roving and yarn. Various quality properties includes Unevenness, Thick +50%/km, Thin -50%/km, Neps +200%/km and Hairiness Index. It need to be noted that for few process materials like Card Sliver, Draw frame sliver and Roving only Unevenness property is tested and for yarn all the quality properties are tested.

Property Card Sliver Draw Frame Sliver Roving Yarn
Value Limit Value Limit Value Limit Value Limit
Unevenness
% 5.20 5.50 2.51 2.20 4.22 4.50 11.32 11.10
Thick +50%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 30 35
Thin
-50%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 25 30
Neps +200%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 34 35
Hairiness Index -- -- -- -- -- -- 3.82 4.00

[0028] It can be observed from the above table that out of all the materials like Card Sliver, Draw Frame Sliver, Roving and Yarn measured for properties like Unevenness%, Thick +50/km, Thin -50/km, Neps +200/km and Hairiness Index, there are 8 values available and out of which two values are outside the limit values and 6 values are within the limit. The values which are outside the limits are indicated in bold fonts.
One simple way of calculating the Quality effectiveness is through an equation as below.

So, in the above example, the Quality effectiveness will be (6/8x100) which is 75%.

[0029] In yet another embodiment, the Quality effectiveness is calculated by means of providing a weightage index value for each property for each textile material. The weightage index can have a numerical range with lower number bearing less importance and higher number bearing high importance. Hence for each parameter at each process stage, the number of parameters which are outside the limit are arrived from the above table. For each parameter which are outside the limit, the weightage index is considered for arriving the “Quality Effectiveness”. In this case, the table is modified as follows.

Property Card Sliver Draw Frame Sliver Roving Yarn
Value Limit Index Value Limit Index Value Limit Index Value Limit Index
Unevenness
% 5.20 5.50 0.2 2.51 2.20 0.3 4.22 4.50 0.4 11.32 11.10 0.4
Thick +50%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 30 35 0.6
Thin
-50%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 25 30 0.6
Neps +200%/km -- -- -- -- -- -- 34 35 0.8
Hairiness Index -- -- -- -- -- -- 3.82 4.00 0.8

The following derived table from the above table indicates the method of arriving the Quality Effectiveness by using the Weightage Index information. Parameter limit flag is set as 1 when the property tested for a particular textile material is outside the defined limits.
Property Textile Material Parameter Limit Flag

(if Yes – 0, If No – 1)
(A)
Weightage Index

(B)

(A x B)
Unevenness
% Card Sliver 0 0.2 0
Unevenness % Draw Frame Sliver 1 0.3 0.3
Unevenness % Roving 0 0.4 0
Unevenness % Yarn 1 0.4 0.4
Thick +50%/km Yarn 0 0.6 0
Thin
-50%/km Yarn 0 0.6 0
Neps +200%/km Yarn 0 0.8 0
Hairiness Index Yarn 0 0.8 0
Sum 2 4.1 0.7

With the above information in the table, the Quality Effectiveness % is calculated as per the formula given below.

[0030] The Quality effectiveness % calculated with the above formula is 82.9%. The above example is provided for an easy understanding of the concept with a simple way of retrieving the quality data and providing a mathematical equation arriving at the resultant value. The equation can be any kind of complicated algorithm also for getting the resultant value.

[0031] Such kind of arriving at a resultant value from various results from a textile testing instrument helps user to understand the level of quality control. For example, one process in a spinning mill may be very important for a user than the other processes. In such cases, arriving such values alerts user about the importance of attending deviations whenever such processes deviates in quality from set limits.

[0032] In certain embodiments, such Quality effectiveness or the single resultant value can be represented either numerically or alternatively it can be represented in any graphical form or as an another alternative both numerical and graphical information can be combined. Such numerical or graphical or a combined representation can be either shown for each type of textile material in the spinning mill or alternatively such representation can be shown commonly for the entire spinning mill.

[0033] Figure 1 represents the flow chart wherein the steps involved in arriving at the Quality effectiveness (5) are explained. Textile material (1) is tested in a textile testing instrument (2) and the Results (3) are obtained from the textile testing instrument (2). Each result (3) is compared against a set limit (4). If a result (3) is deviated from the set limit (4) then it is eliminated from counting and only the results (3) which are not deviated from the set limit (4) are counted. Such results (3) which are not deviated are used for arriving at the resultant value called Quality effectiveness (5). This is one example flow chart representing the method of arriving at the Quality effectiveness (5) and the results (3) instead of different parameter outputs can be different results for different process materials. Set Limits (4) can be checked as an upper control limit or lower control limit based on the behavior of property measured.

[0034] Figure 2 represents a method of representing the Quality Effectiveness (5) wherein a circular path (6) is available in which filling area (7) is computed and plotted as represented in the figure. The filing area (7) is equal to the value of Quality effectiveness (5) computed by the system as explained earlier and the filling area can be a pattern or shade of any colour. At the centre of the circular path (6), the value of Quality Effectiveness (7) is represented numerically.

[0035] Figure 3 represents the method of representing the Quality Effectiveness (5) for all process stages available in a spinning mill individually and an overall Quality Effectiveness (5) represented nearby. The representation contains circular path (6) with filled area (7) and the value of Quality Effectiveness (5) at the centre of the circular path (6). ,CLAIMS:CLAIMS

We Claim:

1. A method of representing the quality deviations of textile materials tested in a textile testing instrument (2) characterized in that said method comprising the following steps:
i. setting the limits(4) for various quality parameters of the textile material (1) measured by the textile testing instrument (2);
ii. testing the textile material (1) for various quality parameters and storing the results (3);
iii. identifying the deviations of the results (3) from the set limits (4) and arriving a quality effectiveness value ( 5) and
iv. representing the quality effectiveness value (5) based on the deviation numerically or graphically or in the combination of both.
2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the limits are set by the user or arrived statistically.
3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the limits are set for one or more types of textile materials available in the spinning mill.
4. The method according to claim 1, wherein a weightage index is provided for various quality parameters for various types of textile materials which forms a part of calculating the deviation information.
5. The method according to claim1 wherein the graphical or numerical or the combination of both of the quality effectiveness value is shown as a common representation for all types of textile materials or as individual representation for each type of textile material tested in the textile testing instrument (2).
6. The method according to claim 1 wherein the representation of the quality effectiveness value (5) comprises a circular path (6) with a filling area (7) where the filling area is equal to the quality effectiveness value (5).
7. The method according to claim 1 wherein the textile testing instrument (2) can be an evenness tester, a tensile tester, a twist tester, a fault classification system and / or a fibre testing instrument.