Spinnability of cotton/milkweed blends on ring, compact and rotor spinning systems

Abstract

The physical characteristics of cotton/milkweed yarns spun on ring, compact and rotor spinning systems in relation to blend proportion and chemical treatment of milkweed fibres have been studied. During spinning of milkweed fibre blends, greater fibre losses in carding and flies during drafting are observed in further stages. It is observed that amongst the ring, compact and rotor yarns, the compact-spun blended yarns show higher yarn tenacity and elongation values followed by ring and rotor-spun yarns. The rotor-spun blended yarns show lower yarn unevenness, imperfections and hairiness values than compact and ring-spun yarns due to its mechanism of yarn formation. With the increase in milkweed proportion, the yarn quality deteriorates, irrespective of spinning systems due to lack of cohesiveness and brittleness of milkweed fibres, and drastic reduction in yarn quality is noticed for 40/60 cotton/milkweed blend. By considering the effect of chemical treatment of milkweed fibres, it is observed that the alkali-treated milkweed fibre blended yarns show better yarn properties due to improvement in fibre friction and elongation values followed by dyed and untreated milkweed fibres.