Waste Control of Waste in

Spinning
August 28, 2017

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Mr. Akash S. Bansode

bansodeaknasa@gmail.com
D.K.T.E. Society’s Textile and Engineering Institute, Ichalkaranji – 416115.

ABSTRACT
A 1% reduction in yarn realization has almost the same economic impact on the
mill’s profit as an increase on 1% in the mixing cost. This is because the resale
value of wastes is much less than the price of the cotton or the yarn. The
control of yarn realization is thus as important to a mill as the control of cotton
and mixing cost. And yet in most mills, the approach to the control of yarn
realization is half-hearted, and depends on records of dubious accuracy.

In this paper, we will first consider the quantities for which records have to be maintained
for estimating waste losses and yarn realization, and then give specific recommendations on
how to collect data, and use them for computing accurately the mixing wise yarn realization.
A simple but effective method of crosschecking the accuracy of the entire recording system
will also be outlined. Norms for waste losses and yarn realization will be given mixing wise,
and an appropriate procedure will be suggested for utilizing the norms for evaluating the
performance of a mill.
Keywords

Yarn Realization, Process Waste, Product Waste, Invisible Loss, Assessment of

Yarn Realization, Doff Weight method, Hank Meter Reading.

1. INTRODUCTION
Yarn Realization denotes the percentage of yarn produced from a given weight
of bale material. The rest is the waste which has much less worth compared to
fresh fibers or yarn. In the last decade or so, the Indian mills have become
acutely aware of this aspect and have introduced effective control and
monitoring mechanism. The wastes are distinctly of two types:

1. The Process waste taken out in the blow room, cards and combers which
accounts for nearly 80% of the total wastes losses in cotton spinning and
50% in manmade and blends spinning. The process waste is decided by
arriving at optimum levels required to achieve the desired yarn quality.
2. The product wastes which are incurred at each stage of processing, the
control over product wastes has to be exercised through effective floor
supervision.
The levels should also be guided by the standards arrived at by the research
associations. A 1% reduction in yarn realization has almost same economic
impact on mill’s profit as increase of 1%. The records required to be maintained
for waste losses and yarn realization are outlined here. Norms for waste losses
and yarn realization are also given.

To have a good control on the process wastes it is important to assess the

wastes in blow room, carding, comber and ring frame at regular intervals. It
should be noted here that the control on wastes has to be concomitant with
achieving the desired level of cleaning.
YARN REALIZATION AND CONTROL OF WASTE IN SPINNING
2. YARN REALIZATION
Establishment of norms for wastes is a pre-requisite for a successful waste
control in a mill. Yarn realization (YR) is largely governed by the level of trash in
cotton, expected yarn quality and type of machinery. Yarn Realization is
governs to improve Yarn Quality, Productivity & waste reduction in process.
From the SITRA paper publication achievable yarn realization can be obtained
using the following formulae:

A. For mills reusing the entire usable wastes in the same mixing
 YR (%) = 97.5 – t – Wk – Wh for carded yarn
 YR (%) = (100 – t – Wk) {1-(Wc/100)} – Wh – 2.5 for combed yarn
B. For mills not reusing the usable wastes in the same mixing
 YR (%) = 97.5 – t – Wk – Wh – Wu for carded yarn
 YR (%) = (100 – t – Wk) {1-(Wc/100)} – Wh – Wu – 2.5 for combed yarn
Where,
t = trash in mixing (%)
Wk = card waste (%)
Wc = comber noil (%)
Wh = yarn waste (%)
Wu = usable waste (%)
2.1 Yarn Realization is affect by following cotton
characteristics
A. Trash % in cotton purchased
Higher the trash% content in bale, higher will be need remove waste in Blow
Room & lower is the Yarn Realization. Material handling storing of material in
ginning process is more responsible for trash% in cotton.
B. Moisture content in cotton
As amount of moisture in cotton goes up, the yarn realization goes down.
C. Short Fiber content in material
Higher the short fiber content, higher is the removing efficiency of short fiber at
comber stage because of that yarn realization become lower.
D. Departments for Yarn Realization
 For Carded Yarn: Blow Room, Carding & Ring Frame
 For Combed Yarn: Blow Room, Carding, Comber & Ring Frame
The control over the Yarn Realization can be done by Owner of Organization,
Manager of Organization, H. O. D. of each department, Supervisors, Workers
these peoples.

3. How Yarn Realization will improve?

Yarn Realization associated mainly with Cotton Feed, Yarn Produce & Waste
generation. To improve yarn realization % we have to concentrate on reduction
in waste generation. Better way to control over the yarn realization by means of
better practical way to control over the waste generation.

The percentage yarn realization depends primarily on process waste taken out at blow
room, card & comber. Waste taken out in bow room depends on trash content of the
mixing. The waste in Cards depends on type of card& also to some extent, on trash in lap.
The waste in comber, depends on nature if fiber length distribution in feed.

Record to Account for Yarn Realization

 Record to Account for Yarn Realization

3.1 Cotton Consumed

3.1.1 Cotton issued
In Bale form of 160 to 165 kg.
3.1.2 Stock in process
Stock in process at various stages has to be adjusted as the weight in kg.
should be multiplied by a factor:
 Blow Room Lap= 100/ (100-B. R. Waste %)

 Card sliver/Drawing sliver/ Roving= 100/ {100-(B. R. waste%+ Card Waste %)}

 Combed Yarn= 100/ {100-(B. R. waste%+ Card Waste %+comber Waste %)}
3.1.3 Waste Generate
 The Process Waste taken out in Blow room, Cards & Combers which account
for nearly 80% of total waste losses in cotton spinning & 50% manmade &
blend spinning.
 The Product wastes which are required a specified treatment at each stage of
processing.
 The Invisible loss is not directly measured. The invisible loss refers to loss
caused by evaporation of moisture content in cotton, dust in atmosphere,
 fluff. The amount of soft waste generated in order of 6% for medium & fine
count and 8-12% for coarse count.
3.1.4 Yarn Produce
The amount of Yarn Produce is measured by two methods as:

1. Doff Weight Method: In this method the amount of yarn produce is measure
by governs the weight of Empty bobbin, weight of tray & weight of full doff.
2. Hank meter Reading: In this method the yarn produced is measured on
length basis as the hank meter is attaché with front roller on ring frame.

4. Assessment of Yarn Realization

The exact assessment of Yarn Realization is not possible. Because problems
associated with Assessments of:

1. Exact amount of Fiber Feed.

2. Determination of exact Yarn Formed.
3. Exact amount of Waste.
4.1 Problems associated with Assessments of Exact amount of
Fiber Feed
 Weight of bale is high so that to weigh the bale more number of laboures are
required
 The quantity of Fiber feed to process is very high it’s more than 10.000 kg/
day
 High capacity & sensitive weight balance is required to weigh the bale of high
weight which is not easily available in mill.
 TOTAL WEIGHT of BALE = Net Weight of fiber + Weight of Packing Material.
4.2 Problems associated with Assessments of Exact amount of
Waste
 Some amount of Fiber goes in atmosphere in the form of FLUFF.
 Moisture affects on waste amount.
 4.3 Problems associated with Assessments of Determination of
exact Yarn Formed
4.3.1 Limitations of Doff weight Method
 Lot of Labour required.
 Transportation required.
 Handling of Material.
 Exact weight of Yarn produce.
4.3.2 Limitations of Hank Meter Method

 Accuracy of Hank Meter.

 Twist Contraction.
 Idle Spindle percentage.
 Bonda Waste

5. Norms for Wastes &Yarn Realization

The values of all wastes are expressed as % of cotton consumed

Content Carded Combed MMF

Count 4-9 10-13 14-25 26-34 28-34 35-44 45-70 71-99 –
Trash% 11 10 7 5 5 4 3 2 –
B.R. Dropping 12 11 7.7 5.4 5.4 4.4 3.2 2.2 0.1
Card waste 4.2 4.2 4.4 4.5 4.5 4.3 4.3 6.4 0.1
Comber Waste – – – – 9 10.9 12 13 –
Sweeping 2 1.8 1.6 1.4 1.4 1.2 1 1 0.5
Clearer waste 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.1
Hard waste 0.6 0.5 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.4
Invisible loss 1.8 1.7 1.6 1.5 1.5 1.3 1.3 1.3 0.3
Y. R % 78.1 79.7 83.6 86.5 77.5 77.4 77.9 77.9 97.6
 Standards for Yarn Realization

B. R. Card Comber Ring Yarn

Category
Waste(%) waste(%) Waste (%) Frame(%) Realization(%)

Carded
Cotton 5–6 5–6 – 3 85 – 88
Count
Combed
Cotton 5–6 5–6 3–5 3 70 – 75
Count
Manmade
1 1 – 2 95 – 97
Fibers

6. Control on waste in spinning

To have a good control on the process waste it is important to assess the waste
in Blow Room, Carding, Comber & Ring Frame at regular intervals. It should be
noted here that the control on waste has to be concomitant with achieving the
desired level of cleaning.

6.1 Blow Rom Waste

The cleaning at Blow Room should always be considered alongwith the following
things:-

1. The cleaning efficiency of blow room machines for, seed coats is much less
than for leafy matter & sand dust taken together.
2. The cleaning efficiency & waste increases as trash content increases.
3. No aspect of yarn quality other than neps & foreign matter is influenced by
the quality of blow room processing.
4. An optimum level of opening is essential for cleaning of cotton.
Improving Cleaning Efficiency & Reducing waste at Blow room
To improve cleaning efficiency of beater, first examine the mechanical condition
of machine, spikes on Krischner beater, blades and fingers on bladed and
Porcupine openers & repair or replace as required. The inter grid bars space
should be check for any chock up. The waste is affected by changes such as:

1. Distance between the grid bars and the angle of inclination of bars.
2. Speed of Beater.
3. Fan speed in relation to the beater speed.
4. Setting between feed rollers & Beaters.
5. Setting between Beater & Grid bars.
6.2 Carding waste
The behavior of waste & cleaning at cards depends on the following
considerations:

1. The total collected waste at card does not show any close relationship with
the trash in the lap feed to the card.
2. The cleaning efficiency achieve in mills is about 80% for most mixing.
However, for fine and superfine mixing for which very high flat speed and low
production rates are employed, a cleaning efficiency of 85% or more is
achieved. The overall effect is that the lint loss in card waste will increases
with decreasing trash content in lap.
3. There is a tendency for the card to compensate for any lack of cleaning in
blow room. The overall cleaning efficiency achieve in the blow room & the
card taken together remains within a narrow range of 93-95%.
Controlling the waste at Card

The following facts should be kept in mind while controlling the waste & cleaning
at cards:

1. Use of only one mote knife, placed slightly below the normal position of the
top mote knife has been observed to give less waste and better cleaning in
cotton mixing.
2. Higher licker-in speed or greater wire point density on licker-in gives higher
cleaning efficiency accompanied by some increase in the lint lost under the
licker-in.
3. Use of perforated undercasing helps in reducing waste.
4. With other speeds and setting held constant, the flat strip waste varies
almost proportionately with the flat speed.
5. Wider front plate and back plate setting increase flat strip waste.
6. For controlling cleaning of the card, almost the only place is the licker-in
region.
7. Card is excellent cleaning machine for seed coats especially the cylinder-flat
region which removes 80% of the seed coats. A higher flat alongwith higher
cylinder speed can be use for better removal of seed coats and also reducing
neps, thick places and Classimat A & B faults. The seed coat content of 0.1%
in the card sliver can be considered as satisfactory.
8. The tandem card gives 5-7% higher cleaning efficiency and better removal of
seed coats.
6.3 Comber waste
One of the main functions of combing is to remove short fibers through taking
out a certain amount of comber waste. The waste thus removed also contains a
large number of neps and foreign matter. Obviously, combing is not required for
manmade fibers as they are free from short fibers and foreign matter. A higher
% of comber waste need not always means that better removal of short fibers
and neps, and therefore may not always be advantageous either for yarn quality
or performance beyond a certain level.

6.3.1 Technological Consideration

For an effective removal of short fibers, retention of long fibers and removal of
neps the following considerations are of up-most importance:

1. The card trailing hooks are longer and more numerous than the leading
hooks. They are removed when fed as leading hooks by keeping an even
number of reversals between the cards and the comber.
 2. The waste at comber can be reduced by increasing pre-comber draft without
affecting the resultant yarn quality. However, a high comber draft also result
in extremely low inter fiber cohesion causing excessive lap linking, frequent
sliver breaks at comber, draw frame and the can feed inter creel. Therefore,
a pre-comber draft of 30-40 for counts upto 40ŝ is adequate. Pre-comber
draft of above 20 is suitable only for very long staple cottons.
3. The proper place for controlling neps is carding and no combing. It is often
more economical to run cards a somewhat low production rate than to take
out extra comber waste.
6.3.2 The waste at comber needs to check and controlling due to the following
reasons

1. More waste than the nominal means financial loss.

2. Less waste than the nominal could lead to unacceptable yarn quality and
performance.
3. Comber waste variation could contribute to lea count variation.
Norms for cleaning coefficients in Blow Room

Cleaning coefficients for

Number of Machines
Seeds & Seed coats Leafy matter & sand dust
1 0.42 0.72
2 0.50 0.80
3 0.56 0.84
4 0.60 0.87
5 0.64 0.89
6 0.66 0.90

Norms for Collected Waste & Cleaning efficiency of Card

Category of waste
Trash in Type of Cleaning
Mixing Flat Licker-
lap (%) card Others Total Efficiency (%)
Strips in
Superfine & Less SHP 2.9 1.6 0.5 4.5
88
Fine than 2 HP 1.9 1.6 0.5 4.0
Medium & 2.0 to SHP 2.0 2.0 0.8 4.8
83
Coarse 2.5 HP 1.5 2.0 0.8 4.3
Range 1.5-2.5 1.5-2.0 0.5-1.0 4-6 85-90

Norms for Comber Waste

Warp Count Group Level of Comber Waste (%)
28-34 7-9
35-44 11-13
46-60 12-14
61-90 13-15
91-120 14-16
6.4 Ring Frame Waste
At many stages of spinning process waste is removed to clear the cotton or to
separate the short fibers but at the stage of Ring spinning there is no need to
remove waste. This step is exclusively for drafting twisting and packing the yarn
in the shape of bobbin. Whatsoever material is wasted here is because of our
inability to control the machine, process or processing condition. Thus control
the waste we have to control all factors.

At the ring frame stage a scope for saving 1.5 to 2 % on these wastes. Waste at ring frame
means wastage of raw material & wastage of conversion cost upto yarn stage. If a mill
spinning 20ś count, having 25000 spindles and production 205 grams/spindle at 96%
spindle utilization saves 1% waste in ring frame it can save about Rs. 12 lacs per year.
6.4.1 Factors Responsible for waste generates in Ring Frame

1. Yarn Breakage rate.

2. Time taken in attending to the yarn breakage.
3. Working practice & culture.
4. Housekeeping & material handling.
5. Mechanical breakdown & failures.
6. Methods of attending to the break downs.
6.4.2 Waste Control in Ring frame
This is done in the following steps:-

1. Analysis and segregation of the waste of different types

2. Weigh that waste and recording that section wise, person wise, shift wise.
3. Comparison with the standards.
4. Feed backs and action to improve waste generation.

7. For check & control all types waste

The following questions are helps to check and control all types of wastes:

Q. Whether a scheduled maintenance program is followed effectively?

Q. Is there cleaning of the floor can do properly?
Q. Is the material handling minimum & adequate?
Q. Whether the stocking place for cotton & yarn is good & sufficient?
Q. Is the average yarn content per bobbin optimum?
Q. Is the proper humidity & temperature being maintained in departments?
If the above questions are put, the solution are worked out effectively implemented with the
basic principles of collection of data, analysis and feed backs are followed consistently, not
only that waste would be controlled also The productivity, working environment and culture
all would simultaneously improve and I feel that if firmly determined every one of us is
capable of controlling it.

Conclusion
In many mills, there is good scope for improving yarn realization and reducing
wastes. Because in the spinning mill waste are generates in more amount & it
can controllable & reducible at some extent. Improvement in yarn realization
results in Rs. 3 to 10 lakhs savings per year.
The following 6 steps would be helpful to improve yarn realization:-
1. Calculate actual yarn realization and different categories of wastes
2. Using the formulae given in this presentation, estimate the expected yarn
realization for the existing working conditions.
3. Compare the actual yarn realization with the expected value and actual
wastes with norms.
4. Analyse the causes for deviation and initiate corrective action.
5. Create awareness among the workers and technical staff about the
importance of waste control.
6. Good supervision and proper maintenance of machinery would help to reduce
the waste.

References
1. Process Control in Spinning by Gadre & Subhramanyam: ATIRA publication,
page No.(45 to 107).
2. Process Control in Spinning by Rattnam, page No. (11 to 30)
3. Paper published by D.Shanmuganandam (Assistant Director) SITRA.
4. Waste Control at Ring Frame by S. K. Srivastav: NITRA publication, page No.
(1.1 to 1.9)
5. Waste Investigation & Control for a Spinning Mill article in The Indian Textile
Journal, September 1984 , published by, Mr. A. R. Nityanand page no.(79 to
86)
6. A study on carding waste collection system in mill article in The Indian Textile
Journal, April 2012, published by, M Muthuvelan, H Balasubramanian and A
Sivaramakrishnan
7. www.fibre2fashion.com
8. www.sitra.org.in