FORM 2
THE PATENTS ACT, 1970 (39 of 1970)
As amended by the Patents (Amendment) Act, 2005
& The Patents Rules, 2003
As amended by the Patents (Amendment) Rules, 2016
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION (See section 10 and rule 13)
TITLE OF THE INVENTION
A PROCESS FOR MANUFACTURING A BLENDED YARN
APPLICANT
RAYMOND LIMITED, an Indian Organization, having its address at New Hind House, Narottam Morarjee Marg, Ballard Estate, Mumbai 400001, Maharashtra, India
Inventor
Bani Bhushan Singh, Q. No – B4/2, Vijaygram, P.O. – Lodhikheda, Tah – Sausar, Dist – Chhindwara – 480108, Madhya Pradesh, India, an Indian National
PREAMBLE TO THE DESCRIPTION
The following specification particularly describes the invention and the manner in which it is to be performed.

TITLE OF THE INVENTION
A process for manufacturing a blended yarn
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[001] The invention generally relates to textiles, more particularly it relates to a process for manufacturing a yarn.
DEFINITIONS
The terms used in accordance with the present disclosure include but are not
limited to the following:
[002] ANTI-STATIC AGENT: An anti-static agent is a substance capable of
preventing, reducing or dissipating electric charges that might otherwise be
produced.
[003] LAP: A Lap is the opened and cleaned fibre which is converted or
transferred into a sheet form of definite width and uniform unit length.
[004] SLIVER: A sliver (rhymes with diver) is a long bundle of fibre that is
generally used to spin yarn. A sliver is created by carding or combing the fibre,
which is then drawn into long strips where the fibre is parallel. When sliver is
drawn further and given a slight twist, it becomes roving.
[005] DOUBLING: A set of number of sliver
[006] CARDING: The disentanglement of fibres by working them between two
closely spaced relatively moving surfaces clothed with pointed wire, pins, and
spikes or saw teeth.

[007] COMBING: Straightening and paralleling of fibre and removing short fibre, Neps and impurities by using a comb or combs assisted by brushes and rollers, and sometimes by knives. [008] NEPS: A small knot of entangled fibres.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[009] The variety of natural and man-made fabrics available today offers a wide selection of fibres for use. But all fabrics are not perfect in one way or other. They all have some good, fair and poor characteristics. Man’s desire, to produce perfect fabrics resulted in the production of blended fabrics. An intimate mixture of two or more fibres spun together is a blend. The individual yarns contain two or more different fibres.
[010] The blending of cellulosic fibres with man-made fibres to produce fabrics with improved characteristics has long been accepted throughout the world. The use of blended fabrics has tremendously increased even in India. With the continuous improvement in blending of the fabrics and the improvement of consumer’s living standards, consumer dress fabric is also increasingly having higher requirements.
[011] Since ancient time’s people have been using fabric made from natural fibre like, cotton, wool, silk and linen etc., however, after industrial revolution, manual operation has shifted towards mechanical operation and textile fabrics were made from not only natural fibre but also from man-made fibres and their blends.

[012] All these different types of fibres are spun into yarn and then fabric from different route of spinning because of their different length. To improve the aesthetic, lustre, drape & pliability of the fabric and to reduce cost of the fabric, these fibres are blended together in different spinning systems.
[013] Mainly short staple fibre are spun through cotton spinning route and long staple fibre like wool and its blends are processed through worsted route. The polyester and viscose fibres are short staple fibres and wool is a long staple fibre hence to prepare an intimate blend of polyester, viscose and wool two different routes of spinning are required which is costly as well as time consuming. [014] Therefore, there exists a need for a process for preparing a blend using at least one short staple fibre and at least one long staple fibre (wool) that does not require two different processes to process the short and the long staple fibre.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[015] Accordingly, the present invention provides a process for manufacturing a blended yarn. The blended yarn is prepared by reducing fibres of a long staple fibre to a predetermined mean fibre length and obtaining a sliver. The sliver is then subjected to a step of breaking fibres of the sliver followed by opening the sliver to obtain reduced fibres of the long staple fibre. Simultaneously, at least two short staple fibres having a predetermined mean fibre length are obtained. The reduced long staple fibres and the obtained short staple fibres are then combined to form a lap. A homogenously blended sliver of the fibres of the reduced long

staple fibre and the short staple fibres is then obtained from the lap. The blended yarn is then obtained by roving and spinning the homogenously blended sliver. [016] The long staple fibre and the short staple fibres in the process of the present invention are selected from polyester, wool, viscose, cashmere, mink, ibex, silk, linen, modal, nylon, bamboo, camel hair, rose and milk. In a preferred embodiment, the long staple fibre is wool and the short staple fibres are polyester and viscose. Further, the mean fibre length of the long staple fibres is reduced to match the mean fibre lengths of the short staple fibres. Accordingly, the sliver formed from the long staple fibre is dyed and drafted and is manually broken down leading to a further reduction in the mean fibre length. Additionally, the lap is further subjected to a step of carding to obtain the homogenously blended sliver of the long staple fibres and the short staple fibres.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[017] Reference will be made to embodiments of the invention, examples of which may be illustrated in accompanying figures. These figures are intended to be illustrative, not limiting. Although the invention is generally described in context of these embodiments, it should be understood that it is not intended to limit the scope of the invention to these particular embodiments.
Figure 1 shows a flowchart of the conventional process of manufacture.
Figure 2 shows a flowchart of the process for manufacturing a blended yarn in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[018] Conventionally, as shown in figure 1, different fibres are individually spun into a yarn and then into a blended yarn from different routes of spinning. These different routes are required because of the difference in the length of the staple fibres. The short staple fibre is spun through cotton spinning route whereas the long staple fibre is spun through worsted route. The process of the present invention however does not require 2 different processes to process the short and the long staple fibre.
[019] The yarn of the present invention comprises two short staple fibres and one long staple fibre. The fibres are selected from the group consisting of polyester, wool, viscose, cashmere, mink, ibex, silk, linen, modal, nylon, bamboo, camel hair, rose and milk fibre. Typically these fibres have a length less than 60mm.
[020] The process of the present invention, as shown in figure 2, initially involves a step of reducing the length of the long staple fibres to a predetermined mean fibre length and then obtaining a sliver of the long staple fibre. In one of the preferred embodiments, wool, which is of long staple fibre is used to achieve the object of the present invention. Accordingly, the sliver obtained is a wool sliver. The predetermined length thus is in the range of 63mm to 70mm. The wool sliver is optionally dyed and drafted which causes additional reduction in the mean fibre length of the wool.
[021] The wool sliver is then subjected to a step of breaking, whereby fibres present in the wool sliver are broken down. In an embodiment, the fibres of the

wool sliver are broken down by passing the sliver through a close drafting zone. Once the fibres of the wool sliver are broken, the wool sliver is then opened to obtain reduced wool fibres. In a parallel step, at least 2 short staple fibres having a predetermined mean fibre length are obtained. More particularly, polyester and viscose having short staple fibres are used to achieve the object of the present invention. The fibres of the polyester, wool and viscose are then combined thoroughly to obtain a lap. The lap is then subjected to a step of carding to obtain a homogenously blended sliver of mixed, parallelized and evenly distributed fibres of polyester, wool and viscose. The blended yarn is obtained by roving and spinning the homogenously blended sliver. The blended yarn then undergoes a step of finishing followed by inspection and grading.
[022] In an embodiment of the present invention, the mean fibre length of the wool fibres is reduced to match the mean fibre length of the viscose fibres. In another embodiment of the present invention, the blended yarn is manufactured through a single route of spinning. The process of the present invention thus does not require 2 different processes to process the short and the long staple fibre because the mean fibre length of the wool fibre is reduced by changing the mechanical setting on the combers to obtain short fibres in the combed wool. The reduction in the mean fibre length and increase in Co-efficient of Variation (CV%) of the wool obtained is in the range of 3mm to 6mm and the compatible fibre length for polyester and viscose is in the range of is 38mm to 51mm and the compatible fibre length for wool is in the range of 63mm to 70mm.

[023] In an exemplary embodiment of the present invention the dyed wool tops are given one extra passage of gilling by addition of spin finish. In another exemplary embodiment of the present invention the wool sliver is manually broken into pieces and laid in between the polyester and the viscose fibres.
[024] EXAMPLES Example 1:
[025] Table 1 illustrates the experimental details of the fabric made from the homogenous yarn of the present invention.

Test Industry Standard Homogenous blend fabric of the present invention
Tearing Strength Warp Min.1.0 Kg. 2.88 Kg
Tearing Strength Weft Min.1.0 Kg. 2.56 Kg
Seam Slippage Warp @ 8 Kg Load Max. 6mm 5 mm
Seam Slippage Weft @ 8 Kg Load Max. 6mm 4 mm
Washing & Ironing Shrinkage Warp @ 40 0 C. Max. 3% 1.2 %
Washing & Ironing Shrinkage Weft @ 40 0 C. Max. 3% 1.3 %
Steaming Shrinkage Warp Max. 2 0.6
Steaming Shrinkage Weft Max. 2 1.9
Pilling Face @ 18000 Rev. Min. 4 4
Pilling Back @ 18000 Rev. Min. 4 4
Elongation % Weft Min. 10 12.0

[026] As seen hereinbefore, a fabric made from the homogenous yarn of the present invention shows better test results as compared to fabrics made by the conventional processes.
Example 2:
[027] Table 2 illustrates increase in efficiency of the process of the present invention, more particularly while spinning.

Parameter Before(P/V) After(P/V/W)
APS(gm/spindle/shift) Resultant(55%P/W&45%P/V) 85.1% 112%
[028] As seen hereinbefore, the average production per spindle per shift (APS) has increased by 31.6% thereby indicating an increase in efficiency in the process of manufacturing the blended yarn of the present invention.
Example 3:
[029] Table 3 illustrates increase in efficiency of the process of the present invention, more particularly while weaving.

Process Efficiency Avg. RPM Pick
per
meter Production
per shift(metre) Production
per day(metre)
Conventional(with arrangement) 84% 415 2650 63 189
Present invention 85% 440 2650 68 204

[030] As seen in the table hereinabove, there is an increase in the RPM by 6% in the present invention, along with an increase in the overall production per shift. Consequently, there is an increase in the production per day which leads to an increased efficiency in the entire process of manufacturing the blended yarn of the present invention.
[031] In another embodiment of the present invention the dope dyed viscose is mixed to the dyed polyester and wool component followed by opening of the viscose fibre by the opener machine.
[032] Advantageously, the present invention is a cost effective process to manufacture a single yarn of a homogenous blend of polyvinyl, viscose and wool as compared to the conventional process whereby two separate yarns of polyvinyl and viscose and polyvinyl and wool are required. The process of the present invention has thus eliminated the requirement of separate units for manufacture of the 2 yarns. Accordingly, as shown hereinabove, the present invention further has an improved efficiency rate and an increased output as compared to the conventional processes of manufacture.
[033] While the present invention has been described with respect to certain embodiments, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various changes and modification may be made without departing from the scope of the invention as defined in the following claims.

WE CLAIM
1. A process for manufacturing a blended yarn comprising the steps of:
- reducing fibres of a long staple fibre to a predetermined mean fibre length and obtaining a sliver;
- breaking fibres of the sliver followed by opening the sliver to obtain reduced fibres of the long staple fibre;
- obtaining at least two short staple fibres having a predetermined mean fibre length;
- combining the reduced long staple fibres and the obtained short staple fibres to form a lap;
- obtaining a homogenously blended sliver of the fibres of the reduced long staple fibres and the short staple fibres from the lap;
-roving and spinning the homogenously blended sliver to obtain the blended yarn.
2. The process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the long staple fibre and the short staple fibres are selected from polyester, wool, viscose, cashmere, mink, ibex, silk, linen, modal, nylon, bamboo, camel hair, rose and milk.
3. The process as claimed in claims 1 and 2, wherein the long staple fibre is wool.

4. The process as claimed in claims 1 and 2, wherein the short staple fibres are polyester and viscose.
5. The process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the mean fibre length of the long staple fibres is reduced to match the mean fibre lengths of the short staple fibres.
6. The process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the sliver formed from the long staple fibre is dyed and drafted.
7. The process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the sliver formed from the long staple fibre is manually broken down leading to a further reduction in the mean fibre length.
8. The process as claimed in claim 1, wherein the lap is further subjected to a step of carding to obtain the homogenously blended sliver of the long staple fibres and the short staple fibres.