Claims:WE CLAIM :

1. A spindle tape used in driving spindle in textile machinery for manufacture of yarn comprising of:
a. having at least one fabric layer where in the warp is a continuous multifilament polyester yarn and weft is spun cotton or any staple fibre yarn, and
b. having an antistatic coating and a polyurethane coating on the warp floating polyester side as friction layer, the said tape characterised in the arrangement of two different layers and such that the selected warp yarn has a high modulus and a low hysteresis value and said polyurethane friction layer is in contact with ABS pulley of the spinning frame which helps gain speed with very low slip and further the spun yarn layer of tape transfers the speed to the spindle warve again with a low slip resulting in higher spindle speed and thus ensuring high energy efficiency.

2. The said spindle tape as claimed in claim 1 has a joint with finger profile.

3. A method of weaving a fabric for spindle tape as claimed in claim 1 is comprising selecting a pattern of the fabric such that the said continuous multifilament polyester warp yarn floats on one side and the spun weft yarn floats on the other side of the fabric.

4. The method of weaving a fabric for spindle tape as claimed in claim 3 comprising selecting continuous filament yarn in warp direction based on the corresponding desired weave pattern.
, Description:Field of Invention:

This invention relates to a spindle tape/belt which drives the spindles with a very high transmission efficiency leading to energy savings with significantly enhanced life and quality of power transmission not hitherto obtained in any of the existing types of tapes in use for this purpose.

Prior Art:

The invention relates to spindle tapes used in driving the spindles in the textile industry for the manufacture of yarn.

It is used in the textile industry for driving spindles on ring spinning and twisting machines. The spindle tape touches the whirls with an arc of contact of at least 90°.

Technical requirements on spindle tapes

High quality spindle tapes must have specific properties such as:

1. Energy saving
Modern, flexible spindle tapes have a high degree of efficiency. As a consequence, considerable energy cost savings can be realized.

2. Easy, fast and reliable joining method
Considering that hundreds of spindle tapes per machine have to be made endless, an easy (preferably adhesive-free) and reliable joining method is required.

3. Highest spindle revolution (rpm)
Spindle tapes for modern spinning machines must be designed for spindle speeds up to 25,000 rpm and higher.

4. High accuracy of spindle revolution
A high modulus of elasticity produces less creep, which means that a smaller speed difference results between the first and the last spindle, which in turn improves yam quality.

5. No fibre /fluff accumulation
Spindle tapes must have sharp, clean, smooth edges, and must not accumulate static charges, so that no fibers or debris is attracted and sticks to the tape surface, thus reducing friction.

6. Long service life, lowdown-time
Along service life of this highly stressed machine element can be expected. Low speed loss of running spindles when neighbour spindles are stopped when a spindle is braked, it is expected that the adjacent spindles continue to run with negligible loss of speed.

7. High temperature resistance
At thread breakage, the spindle will be stopped by a mechanical break. The spindle tape, however, continues to run on the stopped whirl. The resulting temperatures of up to 60°c must be overcome by the spindle tape without any damage.

8. Minimum run-up time
After automatic or manual splicing of the thread, the spindle brake is released and the spindle is again accelerated to its nominal number of revolutions. The run-up time must be within a time frame of a few seconds.

All spindle tapes have two different friction covers. In order to ensure trouble-free, efficient performance of the tapes, it is essential to follow the following rules during installation

• High coefficient of friction on driving pulley
• Medium coefficient of friction on spindle whirl

Conventionally, spindle tapes were made with cotton narrow width fabric. They were cut to the required length and joined by overlapping the ends and sewing them together by means of sewing machines. The main drawback of cotton tapes was high variation in spindle speed due to slippage and poor transmission efficiency. Also, the overlapped joints created high noise and frequent breakages. Later, nylon synthetic sandwich tapes were introduced as an improvement over the cotton tapes. These tapes provided better transmission efficiency, uniformity in speed and longer life. Nylon sandwich tapes consisted of two fabrics, one of which is all-nylon and the other with nylon and cotton or flax combination which were bonded together by resorcinol-based adhesive. The all-nylon side of this bonded fabric is coated with rubber and then vulcanised before slitting into tapes of the required length and width. In the spindle drive circuit, the rubber side of the tape acts as a friction surface and therefore come into contact with the ABS pulley in order to ensure low slip between the tape and pulley. The Fibre side of the tape having an intermediate friction surface transfer the speed to the spindle warve effectively and at the same time during application of the brake in any one spindle of the four-spindle circuit, the tape slide over the stopped spindle without any significant loss in speed of the other spindles. Nylon sandwich tapes are made endless by skiving the two ends and joining them by application of adhesive in a heating press for a few minutes.

Background of the Invention:

Since the cost of power constitute a significant component of the overall manufacturing cost of yarn and driving the spindles being the most power-intensive operation in the entire process of conversion of staple fibre into yarn, it has always been a challenge to bring down the same as much as possible. With this aim, single-ply, polyurethane tapes were introduced. Owing to high flexibility, combined with higher modulus and lower hysteresis, these tapes exhibited much improved power transmission efficiency resulting in significant savings in power cost as compared to nylon sandwich tapes. However, some major disadvantages experienced by the users restricted its acceptance among many spinners. Such single ply polyurethane tapes currently available in the market are made out of polyester/cotton spun yarn in both warp and weft direction of the fabric part of the tape. The entire fabric including the tension member of the tape being a spun yarn, loses its strength due to wear and tear resulting in frequent tape cuts especially after running for a period of 9 to 12 months. In addition to that, variation in wear between tapes within the spinning machine also cause speed variation between spindles resulting in twist variation in the yarn. For these reasons, all the tapes have to be completely replaced with new ones within a years’ time which adds to the cost of spare as well as down time for the spinners.

Object of Invention:

The first object of this invention relates to a fabric particularly used in transmission of belts (here in generally referred to as spindle tapes). These tapes are mainly used drive the spindles in yarn spinning machines.

The second object of this invention is to increase lifecycle of belts. Many Conventional spindle tapes include a single layer fabric or double layer fabric. The fabric is used to give the strength of the spindle tape and the strength retention throughout the spindle tape life cycle normally 12 to 18 months.

The third object of this invention to use combination of yarns to manufacture spindle belt. Normally an woven fabric is used for spindle tapes. Nylon, Spun Cotton and Spun Polyester cotton yarns are used are used as warp yarn of the fabrics and spun cotton, spun polyester cotton is used as fabric weft in woven fabric. These warp yarns are the factor which determines the strength of the tape and also the prime factor which determines the retention of the strength throughout the spindle tape life cycle. Normally Nitrile Butadine rubber (NBR) or thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) is used as friction in spindle tape. NBR type spindle tapes are made endless by adhesives. In TPU type tapes the spindle tapes are melt joint.

The four object of invention is to improve joints of tapes. Spindle tape ends were prepared by rubbing with abrasive wheels. The prepared ends are applied with adhesives and kept under heat and pressure for a stipulated time to attain the proper joint. While in finger joint tapes they are finger punched to certain dimension. The punched fingers are placed and heat and pressure for a stipulated time to attain the joint. The joint strength is one of the factors which determine the life of the tape. The joint strength is depended on the finger dimensions in finger joint tapes

Summary of the Invention:

Primary objective of the invention is therefore, to overcome the said disadvantages experienced in the currently available spindle tapes, without compromising on the advantages of power savings, by incorporating certain novel features in the new tape called XT tape. Thus, the new invention provides for a) higher transmission efficiency than any of the spindle tapes currently in usage, b) no loss in body strength due to wear and tear even after running for a period of more than 18 months, c) no variation in spindle speed even at the end of its targeted life time ensuring uniformity in the yarn twist throughout.

The present invention seeks to mitigate problems encountered to date with spindle tapes having woven fabrics. The present invention further seeks provide an improved woven fabric which increases the retention of the body strength during the spindle tape life cycle in finger joint types tapes.

The present invention also increases the strength of woven fabric which in turn increases the spindle tape life in finger joint type tapes.

The present invention also decreases the surface wear of the fabric.

The present invention maintains fabric surface properties throughout spindle tape life cycle which will not allow any drop in spindle speeds at any stage for the spindle tape life cycle.

The present invention of the joint finger dimensions which will increase the joint strength of the spindle tape.

According to point 1 of the present invention there is provided woven fabric for the use of Spindle tape transmission in yarn spinning the woven fabric comprising of warp yarn multi filament polyester yarn and weft with cotton spun yarn.
The fabric according to present invention will have higher breaking strength in the current finger joint spindle tapes (Fig B).

The high modulus, low hysteresis warp yarn chosen in the present invention provide for energy saving and increased spindle speed.

The fabric according to present invention will increase the joint strength in combination with point 5.

Description of the invention:

The embodiment of the invention is described below with reference to the drawings wherein Figure 1 is a simplified representation of the XT tape. It consists of a friction layer made of polyurethane or any similar high friction thermoplastic elastomer and the tension member which is a fabric made uniquely with high tenacity polyester continuous filament yarn in the warp direction and spun yarn in the weft direction. Whereas such spun yarn used as weft is made out of natural fibres such as cotton/flax or from any man-made fibres. The weave pattern of the fabric is chosen in such a way that the polyester warp yarn floats on one side and the spun yarn in the weft floats on the other side of the fabric. Polyester floating side of the fabric is applied with antistatic and is further coated with polyurethane material of suitable thickness. This coated fabric is further converted to spindle tape by cutting into required length and width and then finger punched at the edges. Punched ends are joined in a hot press to make the same endless tape. While installing, the polyurethane side of the tape acts as friction surface, which comes into contact with the ABS pulley of the spinning frame and help gain speed with very low slip. The spun yarn side of tape transfer the speed to the spindle warve again with a low slip ensuring high energy efficiency, hitherto not obtained in any of the spindle tape currently in use.

The description of invention is made with the support of drawings Fig. 1 & Fig. B.

Part nos. Part name
A Polyurethane
B Antistatic Coating
C Fabric
D Warp direction
E Filament Yarn
F Cotton yarn
G Weft direction

In one aspect the invention relates to a spindle tape used in driving spindle in textile machinery for manufacture of yarn. It has at least one fabric layer where in the warp is a continuous multifilament polyester yarn and weft is spun cotton or any staple fibre yarn. Further it includes having an antistatic coating and a polyurethane coating on the warp floating polyester side as friction layer, the said tape characterised in the arrangement of two different layers and such that the selected warp yarn has a high modulus and a low hysteresis value and said polyurethane friction layer is in contact with ABS pulley of the spinning frame which helps gain speed with very low slip and further the spun yarn layer of tape transfers the speed to the spindle warve again with a low slip resulting in higher spindle speed and thus ensuring high energy efficiency.

In another aspect the spindle tape has a joint with finger profile.

In another aspect the invention also relates to a method of weaving a fabric for spindle tape of selecting a pattern of the fabric such that the said continuous multifilament polyester warp yarn floats on one side and the spun weft yarn floats on the other side of the fabric.

In another aspect the invention also relates additionally to the method of weaving a fabric for spindle tape of selecting continuous filament yarn in warp direction based on the corresponding desired weave pattern.

The novel features of this invention are:

1. The present invention will be the woven fabric comprising polyester multi filament as warp yarn and cotton as weft yarn.
2. The polyester multi filament yarn will have higher breaking strength than the conventional spun yarns used in finger joint spindle tapes.
3. The multifilament used in the woven fabric will have higher wear resistance than the spun yarn used in finger joint spindle tapes.
4. The finger profile dimension (Fig - 2) used in the tape to achieve joint strength i.e., 70% of the body strength.
5. Usage of multifilament yarns (Nylon, polyester, rayon) as a warp element in woven fabric used for finger joint spindle tapes.
6. A transmission belts/tapes according to claim 1 used for driving spindles in yarn spinning machines.(Fig – 3)
7. Usage of cotton yarn or any staple fibre spun as weft component in woven fabric for finger joint spindle tapes.(Fig – 4)

8. Here finger joint spindle tape refers as tape is prepared for fingers to make it endless by applying heat and pressure.
9. Usage of the spindle tape joining finger length 30 to 50 mm for the spindle tape width of 5 mm to 25 mm. (Fig – 2)
10. The High-performance spindle tape XT, having its tension member in the form of a single fabric made uniquely with high tenacity polyester or any man made continuous filament yarn in warp direction.
11. The fabric as claimed in claim 1, having its weft component in transverse direction made out of spun yarns,
12. Such spun yarns as claimed in claim 2 are made out of natural fibres such as cotton/flax or any man-made fibre having medium frictional characteristics,
13. Weave pattern in the said fabric is chosen specifically in a way to make the spun yarn in the weft to float on one surface and polyester continuous filament yarn in the warp to float on the other.
14. The fabric thus produced as claimed in claim 4, wherein the polyester surface is coated with anti-static material followed by polyurethane as friction layer.
15. The spun yarn floating surface of the fabric as claimed in claim 4), is either thinly coated with fibre binders such as PU or PVA or any type of sizing solution to prevent fibre protrusion while cutting or left alone without any coating.
16. The high-performance XT tape substantially herein described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

The High-performance spindle tape XT, is produced by bringing all the above methods together in the single ply spindle tape, enabling the said tape to acquire properties that enhances its working life by more than fifty percent as compared to any of the existing single ply polyurethane tape. While ensuring higher energy saving, with no deterioration in strength and quality of transmission of power. Additionally, the usable working life of the said new tape is claimed to be more than 50% of the any conventional single ply polyurethane tapes, is the major hallmark of this invention.

Having now described various embodiments of the invention in detail as required in the application, those skilled in the art will recognize modifications and substitutions to the specific embodiments disclosed herein. Such modifications are within the scope and intent of the present invention as defined in the claims.