CA1114111A - Method and apparatus for continuously processing various kinds of cloth materials in a high pressure steamer for multipurpose treatments - Google Patents
Method and apparatus for continuously processing various kinds of cloth materials in a high pressure steamer for multipurpose treatmentsInfo
- Publication number
- CA1114111A CA1114111A CA286,907A CA286907A CA1114111A CA 1114111 A CA1114111 A CA 1114111A CA 286907 A CA286907 A CA 286907A CA 1114111 A CA1114111 A CA 1114111A
- Authority
- CA
- Canada
- Prior art keywords
- cloth material
- guide members
- steamer
- rolls
- cloth
- Prior art date
- Legal status (The legal status is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the status listed.)
- Expired
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Classifications
-
- D—TEXTILES; PAPER
- D06—TREATMENT OF TEXTILES OR THE LIKE; LAUNDERING; FLEXIBLE MATERIALS NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR
- D06B—TREATING TEXTILE MATERIALS USING LIQUIDS, GASES OR VAPOURS
- D06B17/00—Storing of textile materials in association with the treatment of the materials by liquids, gases or vapours
- D06B17/005—Storing of textile materials in association with the treatment of the materials by liquids, gases or vapours in helical form
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- Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
- Chemical & Material Sciences (AREA)
- Materials Engineering (AREA)
- Textile Engineering (AREA)
- Treatment Of Fiber Materials (AREA)
Abstract
ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE
The disclosure describes a method of processing cloth material in a high pressure steamer on a continuous basis. The method comprises feeding the cloth material con-tinuously into the steamer body having hot, humid and pressur-ized atmosphere, constraining the cloth material by an arrange-ment of guide members to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path within the steamer body, only one side of the cloth material contacting the guide members, reversing the direction of travel of the cloth material in the region of the centre of the spiral by means of reversing guide members, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of further guide members to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path, only the other side of the cloth material contacting the further guide members, and then continuously feeding the cloth material out of the steamer body. Also described is an apparatus comprising a streamer having inlet and outlet open-ings, means sealing the inlet and outlet openings whilst allowing cloth material to be treated to pass therethrough, an arrangement of guide members and further guide members within the steamer respectively defining two interwound generally spiral paths and reversing means in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths. With this apparatus a cloth material may be fed into the steamer body through the inlet opening, constrained to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path by the guide members whilst only one side of the cloth material contacts the guide members, have the direction of travel reversed by the reversing means, constrained to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path by the further guide members whilst only the other side of the cloth material contacts the further guide members and finally is fed out of the steamer body through the outlet opening.
The disclosure describes a method of processing cloth material in a high pressure steamer on a continuous basis. The method comprises feeding the cloth material con-tinuously into the steamer body having hot, humid and pressur-ized atmosphere, constraining the cloth material by an arrange-ment of guide members to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path within the steamer body, only one side of the cloth material contacting the guide members, reversing the direction of travel of the cloth material in the region of the centre of the spiral by means of reversing guide members, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of further guide members to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path, only the other side of the cloth material contacting the further guide members, and then continuously feeding the cloth material out of the steamer body. Also described is an apparatus comprising a streamer having inlet and outlet open-ings, means sealing the inlet and outlet openings whilst allowing cloth material to be treated to pass therethrough, an arrangement of guide members and further guide members within the steamer respectively defining two interwound generally spiral paths and reversing means in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths. With this apparatus a cloth material may be fed into the steamer body through the inlet opening, constrained to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path by the guide members whilst only one side of the cloth material contacts the guide members, have the direction of travel reversed by the reversing means, constrained to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path by the further guide members whilst only the other side of the cloth material contacts the further guide members and finally is fed out of the steamer body through the outlet opening.
Description
~5 ~4~l11 This invention relates to a method of and an apparatus for continuously processing various kinds of cloth materials in ~ ~igh pressure steamer. The process to which the cloth mat-erial is subjected may be, for example, a continuous moist-heat treatment of a knitted cloth material under essentially no-tension conditions, or a continuous print colour developing treatment for a printed cloth material.
Various cloth materials can easily elongate when being processed. For instance, a knitted cloth tend~s to elon-gate ~or stretch) when subjected to a continuous treatment carried out under relatively high moist-heat conditions exceed- ~ ;~
ing 102C. Any such elongation impairs the bulk state of the cloth material and to prevent the elongation, it has been the practice to move a cloth material through a steamer by hanging the material in loops from a suitable mechanism arranged inside the high pressure steamer body. In such a method, however, the cloth material still elongates due to its own weight, in the loops. In view of this short-coming, there has been proposed another method wherein a multi-stage belt conveyor is arranged inside the body of the high pressure steamer, for carrying t~e cloth. Such a multistage belt conveyer arrangement is, how-ever, complex in construction and is thus expensive. Besides, such treatments require the cloth to be inside the steamer for a long time, and if the steamer is used as a part of a continu-ous high speed process, it-is not possible to maintain the cloth in the steamer for a sufficiently long time.
If a dye is to be fixed to a cloth material which has been printed with t~e dye in a desired pattern, there has been proposed a method in which the printed cloth material is intro-~0 duced into a high pressure steamer to fix the dye to the clothmaterial under conditions of high moist-heat, while allowing the cloth material to travel in a zig-zag manner over guide - 1 - ~ ' . ~
.
rolls arranged in two rows, one above the other in the steamer body. How~ver~ by constraining the cloth material to pass round rolls alternately in the upper and lower rows thereof, the obverse and reverse sides of the cloth material being pro-cessed alternately come in contact with the guide rolls. When the printed side of the cloth material (the obverse) comes into contact with the guide rolls, there is a tendency for the print either to blurr or otherwise to give a poorly finished cloth.
To eliminate the shortcoming of the above fixing method, it has been proposed to prevent the printed face of the cloth material from coming in contact with the guide rolls by the use of the cloth hanging arrangement, such has been men-tioned above, in such a way as to move the cloth material in loops. However, such a method requires a cloth pinch feeding ~;
mechanism to control the loops, but this makes the arrangement complex, greatly increases the capital cost of the e~uipment and moreover is likely to degrade the print quality. ;
There has been propose~ yet another method in which a batch o~ cloth material is constrained to pass round a number of rolls arranged in a treatment chamber to define a spiral path for the material. In this method, the batch of cloth material is fed from the centre of the spiral into the cham~er and around the spiral path to the outside of the chamber. How-ever, this method is not suitable for the continuous processing of material since the method may be employed only for separate batches of material which are fed into the chamber from the centre of ~he spiral.
According to this invention, there is provided a method of processing clot~ material in a high pressure steamer on a continuous basis, which method comprises feeding the cloth material continuously into the steamer body having hot, humid .',: ' '~ ' ~ ; ,' 49L~1 and pressurized atmosphere, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of guide members to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path within the steamer body, only one side of the cloth material contacting the guide members, reversing the direction of travel of the cloth material in the region of the centre of the spiral by means of reversing guide members, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of further guide members to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path interwound with the first-mentioned generally spiral path, only the other side of the cloth material contacting the further guide members, and then continuously feeding the cloth material out of the steamer body.
In the method of this invention, the cloth material is not elongated through hanging loops, nor is the print qual-ity (for a printed cloth~ degraded by contact of the obverse surface with the guide members defining the path along which the cloth material passes. Moreover, the arrangement is such that it is possible to ensure sufficiently long period elapses for the required moist-heat treatment to be completed, even with high speed processing, before the reverse of the cloth material contacts the reversing means or further guide means.
According to another aspect of this invention, there is provided apparatus for the continuous treatment of cloth material, which apparatus comprises a steamer having inlet and outlet openings, means sealing the inlet and outlet openings whilst allowing cloth material to be treated to pass there-through, an arrangement of guide members and further guide members within the steamer respQctively defining two inter-wound generally spiral paths and reversing means in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths, so that a cloth material may be fed into the steamer body through the inlet opening, constrained to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral _ 3 _ -path by the guide members whilst only one side of the cloth material contacts the guide members, have the direction of travel reversed by the reversing means, constrained to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path by the further guide members whilst only the other side of the cloth material contacts the further guide members and finally is fed out of the steamer body through the outlet opening.
~ It is preferred for the guide members and further guide members to be rolls rotatably mounted within the steamer body, at least some of which may be power-driven to cause cloth material constrained to follow the spiral paths to ~ravel around said paths. The reversing means also conveniently com-prises a pair of rotatably mounted rolls, the cloth material -being treated passing firstly around one roll and then around the other.
The sealing means for the inlet and outlet openings preferably comprise roll seal mechanisms, though other seal arrangements allowing the continuous feeding of cloth material could equally well be used.
Conveniently, a reservoir for treatment li~uid is arranged in the region of the reversing means, so that cloth `
material being treated may pass through the liquid at ~he centre of t~e first generally spiral path, before being constrained to follow the outwardly-directed generally spiral path. Further treatment may thus occur on the second spiral path.
In one embodiment of this invention, especially adapted to the continuous colour developing and fixing of dyes printed on cloth material, the printed face of the cloth mat-erial does not come in contact with the guide members until the print dye is thoroughly fixed to the cloth material, which occurs before t~e cloth material reaches the reversing means.
Then, the cloth material is turned over by the reversing means ' ' .
and begins to travel in the opposite direction with the other, printed face contacting the ~urther guide members, but the re-verse not coming in contact with further guide members until the cloth material leaves the steamer body.
In another embodiment of this invention especially adapted for the treatment of cloth material, such as a knitted cloth, which easily elongates, the material is processed under conditions of substantially no tension. In this embodiment, the cloth material to be processed is temporarily collected on a timing piler after entering the steamer body through the inlet opening, and from there is gradually fed around guide rolls which are spirally arranged as described in the fore-going. The cloth material is thus caused to follow a spiral path similar to that in ~he embodiment described above, until the moist-heat treatment is accompli~hed. Then, at the revers-ing rolls at the central region of the spirals, the cloth mat-erial is turned over and the direction of travel of the cloth material is reversed. From there, the cloth material is moved on guide rolls on the other, interwound spiral path, to the out-let. By providing several driven rolls, the cloth material can be fed under conditions of substantially no tension, and only ;
minimal sagging between the rolls tends to occ~r. On a lower run, when the cloth material is below the rolls, the cloth material can be supported by the rolls defining the other spiral path should the cloth tend to sag too much.
By way o~ example only, two specific embodiments of ap~aratus constructed in accordance with this invention will now be described, reference being made to the accompanying drawings, in which:- -Figure 1 is a diagrammatic cross-sectional view through a first embodiment of steamer adapted for tha continu-ous colour development treatment of various kinds of cloth, -.
accordiny to this invention, and Figure 2 is a diagrammatic cross-sectional view through a second embodiment of steamer, adapted for the treat-ment of various kinds of cloth such as knitted cloth, under conditions of substantially no tension.
Referring to Figure 1, there is illustrated an em-bodiment of this invention adapted for a continuous print colour developing treatment of cloth matarial, to ensure a clear print finish of a printed cloth material. In this treat-ment, the cloth is subjected to a high pressureJ high tempera-ture and high humidity atmosphere in a steamer body 1 whilst preventing the printed cloth material from coming into con~
tact with guide rolls disposed in the body, until the print dye is properly fixed.
The steamer body 1 of the high pressure steamer is provided with an inlet roll seal mechanism 2 disposed over an inlet opening for cloth material, and an outlet xoll seal mechanism 3 disposed over an outlet opening for cloth material.
~hese seal mechanisms 2 and 3 serve to maintain the high pres-sure moist heat inside the steamer body while allowing thecloth material 7 to be continuously introduced into the drum body 1 and when treated to be continuously taken out of the body. However, such sealing mechanisms are known in the art and are not directly related to this invention; they are not therefore described in detail here. Moreover, there is no restriction on the position of the inlet and outlet openings and although in this particular example the openings are dis-. ~.posed on opposite sides of the body, they may be disposed in other suitable parts of the body 1. Different seal mechanisms allowing the continuous feeding of cloth material may also be used.
Inside the drum body 1, there are disposed many guide rolls 4 in a generally double spiral arrangement to define two ~ 6 -,....... . . . .
. ~
, interwound generally spiral paths for cloth material being treated. Cloth driving and spreading rolls 4' are disposed at suitable positions among the guide rolls. At the central region of the double spixal arrangement of the rolls, there are disposed reversing rolls 5 opposed to each other, with the lower reversing roll 5 partially within a liquid reservoir 6.
The operation of the above described colour develop-ing device will now be explained.
Cloth material 7, which has been printed by means of a known printing arrangement (not shown) is introduced into the steamer body 1 through the inlet seal mechanism 2. The cloth material is moved around the generally spiral arrangement of guide rolls 4 and the cloth spreading and driving rolls 4', so as to be treated, whilst supported in a generally spiral path, by the moist heat within the body 1. From the time the cloth material enters the steamer body 1 to the arrival of the cloth material at the reversing rolls 5, only one side of the cloth material 7 comes in contact with the guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4'. Therefore, l:he printed face of the ~
cloth material 7 should be arranged to be on the side not con- -tacting these rolls, so that the dye applied to the printed ~ace is allowed to be fixed completely to the cloth, giving a clean print without degradation of the printed pattern or tainting which otherwise tends to be caused by contact with rolls. ~hen, after passing over the reversing rolls 5, the printed face comes in contact with the guide rolls 4 and cloth driving rolls ~
of the other spiral path, while the cloth material continues its travel. By the time the cloth material reaches the reversing rolls 5, however, the dye has already been firmly fixed to the cloth material 7 so that the moist heat treatment can be com-pleted without risk of the quality of the print being degraded.
Warm water, liquid chemicals or other liquids may be contained in the liquid reservoir 6. Then, as the cloth material is moved ~ 7 from the reversing rolls 5 to the outlet seal mechanism 3, the cloth material may further be treated, for instance to impart a particular -'feel' to the cloth or to give a felting treatment.
Various cloths can successully be treated in the above described apparatus, such as 100% cotton, 100% polyester or mixtures thereof. When printed, the cloth is fed into the steamer already having an atmosphere of high temperaturs, high pressure and high humidity, with the non-printed side contact- ' ing the rolls 4 and 4' on the first spiral path up to the `
reversing rolls 5. During being guided in this initial spiral path inside the steamer body 1 the colour is fully developed and fixed. After being reversed, the cloth is fed along the second spiral path and thence to the outle~ seal mechanism 3.
Thus, a continuous developing and fixing process can be carried out, without the printed face coming into contact with guide ~
rolls until the fixing is completed. ;
Figure 2 illustrates another embodiment of this invention adapted ~or application to a continuous treatment process of a cloth material ~hat eas:ily elongates, such as a knitted fabric, especially under conditions of high moist ~ -heat at a temperature of at least 102 QC. Referring to Figure
Various cloth materials can easily elongate when being processed. For instance, a knitted cloth tend~s to elon-gate ~or stretch) when subjected to a continuous treatment carried out under relatively high moist-heat conditions exceed- ~ ;~
ing 102C. Any such elongation impairs the bulk state of the cloth material and to prevent the elongation, it has been the practice to move a cloth material through a steamer by hanging the material in loops from a suitable mechanism arranged inside the high pressure steamer body. In such a method, however, the cloth material still elongates due to its own weight, in the loops. In view of this short-coming, there has been proposed another method wherein a multi-stage belt conveyor is arranged inside the body of the high pressure steamer, for carrying t~e cloth. Such a multistage belt conveyer arrangement is, how-ever, complex in construction and is thus expensive. Besides, such treatments require the cloth to be inside the steamer for a long time, and if the steamer is used as a part of a continu-ous high speed process, it-is not possible to maintain the cloth in the steamer for a sufficiently long time.
If a dye is to be fixed to a cloth material which has been printed with t~e dye in a desired pattern, there has been proposed a method in which the printed cloth material is intro-~0 duced into a high pressure steamer to fix the dye to the clothmaterial under conditions of high moist-heat, while allowing the cloth material to travel in a zig-zag manner over guide - 1 - ~ ' . ~
.
rolls arranged in two rows, one above the other in the steamer body. How~ver~ by constraining the cloth material to pass round rolls alternately in the upper and lower rows thereof, the obverse and reverse sides of the cloth material being pro-cessed alternately come in contact with the guide rolls. When the printed side of the cloth material (the obverse) comes into contact with the guide rolls, there is a tendency for the print either to blurr or otherwise to give a poorly finished cloth.
To eliminate the shortcoming of the above fixing method, it has been proposed to prevent the printed face of the cloth material from coming in contact with the guide rolls by the use of the cloth hanging arrangement, such has been men-tioned above, in such a way as to move the cloth material in loops. However, such a method requires a cloth pinch feeding ~;
mechanism to control the loops, but this makes the arrangement complex, greatly increases the capital cost of the e~uipment and moreover is likely to degrade the print quality. ;
There has been propose~ yet another method in which a batch o~ cloth material is constrained to pass round a number of rolls arranged in a treatment chamber to define a spiral path for the material. In this method, the batch of cloth material is fed from the centre of the spiral into the cham~er and around the spiral path to the outside of the chamber. How-ever, this method is not suitable for the continuous processing of material since the method may be employed only for separate batches of material which are fed into the chamber from the centre of ~he spiral.
According to this invention, there is provided a method of processing clot~ material in a high pressure steamer on a continuous basis, which method comprises feeding the cloth material continuously into the steamer body having hot, humid .',: ' '~ ' ~ ; ,' 49L~1 and pressurized atmosphere, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of guide members to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path within the steamer body, only one side of the cloth material contacting the guide members, reversing the direction of travel of the cloth material in the region of the centre of the spiral by means of reversing guide members, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of further guide members to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path interwound with the first-mentioned generally spiral path, only the other side of the cloth material contacting the further guide members, and then continuously feeding the cloth material out of the steamer body.
In the method of this invention, the cloth material is not elongated through hanging loops, nor is the print qual-ity (for a printed cloth~ degraded by contact of the obverse surface with the guide members defining the path along which the cloth material passes. Moreover, the arrangement is such that it is possible to ensure sufficiently long period elapses for the required moist-heat treatment to be completed, even with high speed processing, before the reverse of the cloth material contacts the reversing means or further guide means.
According to another aspect of this invention, there is provided apparatus for the continuous treatment of cloth material, which apparatus comprises a steamer having inlet and outlet openings, means sealing the inlet and outlet openings whilst allowing cloth material to be treated to pass there-through, an arrangement of guide members and further guide members within the steamer respQctively defining two inter-wound generally spiral paths and reversing means in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths, so that a cloth material may be fed into the steamer body through the inlet opening, constrained to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral _ 3 _ -path by the guide members whilst only one side of the cloth material contacts the guide members, have the direction of travel reversed by the reversing means, constrained to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path by the further guide members whilst only the other side of the cloth material contacts the further guide members and finally is fed out of the steamer body through the outlet opening.
~ It is preferred for the guide members and further guide members to be rolls rotatably mounted within the steamer body, at least some of which may be power-driven to cause cloth material constrained to follow the spiral paths to ~ravel around said paths. The reversing means also conveniently com-prises a pair of rotatably mounted rolls, the cloth material -being treated passing firstly around one roll and then around the other.
The sealing means for the inlet and outlet openings preferably comprise roll seal mechanisms, though other seal arrangements allowing the continuous feeding of cloth material could equally well be used.
Conveniently, a reservoir for treatment li~uid is arranged in the region of the reversing means, so that cloth `
material being treated may pass through the liquid at ~he centre of t~e first generally spiral path, before being constrained to follow the outwardly-directed generally spiral path. Further treatment may thus occur on the second spiral path.
In one embodiment of this invention, especially adapted to the continuous colour developing and fixing of dyes printed on cloth material, the printed face of the cloth mat-erial does not come in contact with the guide members until the print dye is thoroughly fixed to the cloth material, which occurs before t~e cloth material reaches the reversing means.
Then, the cloth material is turned over by the reversing means ' ' .
and begins to travel in the opposite direction with the other, printed face contacting the ~urther guide members, but the re-verse not coming in contact with further guide members until the cloth material leaves the steamer body.
In another embodiment of this invention especially adapted for the treatment of cloth material, such as a knitted cloth, which easily elongates, the material is processed under conditions of substantially no tension. In this embodiment, the cloth material to be processed is temporarily collected on a timing piler after entering the steamer body through the inlet opening, and from there is gradually fed around guide rolls which are spirally arranged as described in the fore-going. The cloth material is thus caused to follow a spiral path similar to that in ~he embodiment described above, until the moist-heat treatment is accompli~hed. Then, at the revers-ing rolls at the central region of the spirals, the cloth mat-erial is turned over and the direction of travel of the cloth material is reversed. From there, the cloth material is moved on guide rolls on the other, interwound spiral path, to the out-let. By providing several driven rolls, the cloth material can be fed under conditions of substantially no tension, and only ;
minimal sagging between the rolls tends to occ~r. On a lower run, when the cloth material is below the rolls, the cloth material can be supported by the rolls defining the other spiral path should the cloth tend to sag too much.
By way o~ example only, two specific embodiments of ap~aratus constructed in accordance with this invention will now be described, reference being made to the accompanying drawings, in which:- -Figure 1 is a diagrammatic cross-sectional view through a first embodiment of steamer adapted for tha continu-ous colour development treatment of various kinds of cloth, -.
accordiny to this invention, and Figure 2 is a diagrammatic cross-sectional view through a second embodiment of steamer, adapted for the treat-ment of various kinds of cloth such as knitted cloth, under conditions of substantially no tension.
Referring to Figure 1, there is illustrated an em-bodiment of this invention adapted for a continuous print colour developing treatment of cloth matarial, to ensure a clear print finish of a printed cloth material. In this treat-ment, the cloth is subjected to a high pressureJ high tempera-ture and high humidity atmosphere in a steamer body 1 whilst preventing the printed cloth material from coming into con~
tact with guide rolls disposed in the body, until the print dye is properly fixed.
The steamer body 1 of the high pressure steamer is provided with an inlet roll seal mechanism 2 disposed over an inlet opening for cloth material, and an outlet xoll seal mechanism 3 disposed over an outlet opening for cloth material.
~hese seal mechanisms 2 and 3 serve to maintain the high pres-sure moist heat inside the steamer body while allowing thecloth material 7 to be continuously introduced into the drum body 1 and when treated to be continuously taken out of the body. However, such sealing mechanisms are known in the art and are not directly related to this invention; they are not therefore described in detail here. Moreover, there is no restriction on the position of the inlet and outlet openings and although in this particular example the openings are dis-. ~.posed on opposite sides of the body, they may be disposed in other suitable parts of the body 1. Different seal mechanisms allowing the continuous feeding of cloth material may also be used.
Inside the drum body 1, there are disposed many guide rolls 4 in a generally double spiral arrangement to define two ~ 6 -,....... . . . .
. ~
, interwound generally spiral paths for cloth material being treated. Cloth driving and spreading rolls 4' are disposed at suitable positions among the guide rolls. At the central region of the double spixal arrangement of the rolls, there are disposed reversing rolls 5 opposed to each other, with the lower reversing roll 5 partially within a liquid reservoir 6.
The operation of the above described colour develop-ing device will now be explained.
Cloth material 7, which has been printed by means of a known printing arrangement (not shown) is introduced into the steamer body 1 through the inlet seal mechanism 2. The cloth material is moved around the generally spiral arrangement of guide rolls 4 and the cloth spreading and driving rolls 4', so as to be treated, whilst supported in a generally spiral path, by the moist heat within the body 1. From the time the cloth material enters the steamer body 1 to the arrival of the cloth material at the reversing rolls 5, only one side of the cloth material 7 comes in contact with the guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4'. Therefore, l:he printed face of the ~
cloth material 7 should be arranged to be on the side not con- -tacting these rolls, so that the dye applied to the printed ~ace is allowed to be fixed completely to the cloth, giving a clean print without degradation of the printed pattern or tainting which otherwise tends to be caused by contact with rolls. ~hen, after passing over the reversing rolls 5, the printed face comes in contact with the guide rolls 4 and cloth driving rolls ~
of the other spiral path, while the cloth material continues its travel. By the time the cloth material reaches the reversing rolls 5, however, the dye has already been firmly fixed to the cloth material 7 so that the moist heat treatment can be com-pleted without risk of the quality of the print being degraded.
Warm water, liquid chemicals or other liquids may be contained in the liquid reservoir 6. Then, as the cloth material is moved ~ 7 from the reversing rolls 5 to the outlet seal mechanism 3, the cloth material may further be treated, for instance to impart a particular -'feel' to the cloth or to give a felting treatment.
Various cloths can successully be treated in the above described apparatus, such as 100% cotton, 100% polyester or mixtures thereof. When printed, the cloth is fed into the steamer already having an atmosphere of high temperaturs, high pressure and high humidity, with the non-printed side contact- ' ing the rolls 4 and 4' on the first spiral path up to the `
reversing rolls 5. During being guided in this initial spiral path inside the steamer body 1 the colour is fully developed and fixed. After being reversed, the cloth is fed along the second spiral path and thence to the outle~ seal mechanism 3.
Thus, a continuous developing and fixing process can be carried out, without the printed face coming into contact with guide ~
rolls until the fixing is completed. ;
Figure 2 illustrates another embodiment of this invention adapted ~or application to a continuous treatment process of a cloth material ~hat eas:ily elongates, such as a knitted fabric, especially under conditions of high moist ~ -heat at a temperature of at least 102 QC. Referring to Figure
2, the steamer body 1 is provided with roll seal mechanisms 2 and 3 at its inlet and outlet openings respecti~ely. The des-cription of these seal mechanisms is again omitted for the same reason as in the preceding embodiment. In this case also, the seal mechanisms 2 and 3 may be differently constructed and may be arranged at other suitable positions than those illus-trated.
Inside the steamer body 1, there are disposed guide rolls 4 with cloth spreading and driving rolls 4' (shown in heavier outline) dispersed among the rolls 4 at suitable posi-tions, the rolls 4 and 4' defining a double spiral path along ~`}~ - 8 -, .
which a cloth material 11 may be moved for treatment without being loaded with any substantial tension. At the central region of the double spiral roll arrangement, there is pro-vided an opposed pair of reversing rolls 5~ The lower revers-ing roll 5 is partially disposed in a liquid reservoir 5, as in the previous embodiment. In the vicinity of the inlet seal mechanism 2, but inside the steamer body 1, there is disposed a timing piler 7 for the cloth material. Inside the steamer body 1, in the upper part thereof, there is provided a drip tray 8, to catch any~drips falling from the top of the steamer, before the drips can contact the cloth material being treated.
In the lower part of the steamer body 1, there are heating pipes 9, rolls 10 being disposed beneath the spiral roll arrangement to hold cloth material above any liquid in the stea~ler.
me above-described em~odiment operates as follows.
A knitted cloth material 11 to be treated is intro-duced into the steamer body 1 through the inlet seal mechanism 2.
The introduced cloth material i5 collected on the timing piler 7, the cloth material then being gradually drawn from the timing piler 7 toward the spiral arrangement of guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4', so as to cause it to travel in a gener-ally spiral manner while the moist-heat treatment is carried out.
The direction of travel of the cloth material is reversed by the reversing rolls 5, and then the cloth material follows a generally spiral path but in the reverse direction. Finally, `
after leaving the second generally spiral path, the cloth mat-erial 11 is guided to the outside of the steamer body 1, leav-ing through the seal mechanism 3. Because the cloth material is caused to travel around the two generally spiral paths ~ ~
defined by the guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4', ~ ~
it moves from one roll to another in a state substantially free of tension. Virtually no sag takes place between the rolls _ g _ .
, . , :
When carried by the upper faces of the rolls. On the other hand, although there is a tendency to sag when the cloth mat-erial moves below the lower faces of the rolls, it is prevented ~ ~
from sagging too much by the rolls that are arranged below ~ -that path. With the cloth material thus arranged to travel in a substantially no-tension state, even in cases where the cloth material being processed is a knitted material which tends easily to stretch, the material can continuously be processed under conditions of high moist-heat without impairing the bulki~
ness and feel of the material. Moreover, by constraining the - cloth material to follow two interwound spiral paths, first forwardly and then backwardly, the cloth material may stay in-side the steamer body for a sufficiently long period to allow an effective moist heat treatment thereof. Also, treatment chemicals may be contained in the reser~oir 6, as in the first-described embodiment.
.
'':
`':
Inside the steamer body 1, there are disposed guide rolls 4 with cloth spreading and driving rolls 4' (shown in heavier outline) dispersed among the rolls 4 at suitable posi-tions, the rolls 4 and 4' defining a double spiral path along ~`}~ - 8 -, .
which a cloth material 11 may be moved for treatment without being loaded with any substantial tension. At the central region of the double spiral roll arrangement, there is pro-vided an opposed pair of reversing rolls 5~ The lower revers-ing roll 5 is partially disposed in a liquid reservoir 5, as in the previous embodiment. In the vicinity of the inlet seal mechanism 2, but inside the steamer body 1, there is disposed a timing piler 7 for the cloth material. Inside the steamer body 1, in the upper part thereof, there is provided a drip tray 8, to catch any~drips falling from the top of the steamer, before the drips can contact the cloth material being treated.
In the lower part of the steamer body 1, there are heating pipes 9, rolls 10 being disposed beneath the spiral roll arrangement to hold cloth material above any liquid in the stea~ler.
me above-described em~odiment operates as follows.
A knitted cloth material 11 to be treated is intro-duced into the steamer body 1 through the inlet seal mechanism 2.
The introduced cloth material i5 collected on the timing piler 7, the cloth material then being gradually drawn from the timing piler 7 toward the spiral arrangement of guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4', so as to cause it to travel in a gener-ally spiral manner while the moist-heat treatment is carried out.
The direction of travel of the cloth material is reversed by the reversing rolls 5, and then the cloth material follows a generally spiral path but in the reverse direction. Finally, `
after leaving the second generally spiral path, the cloth mat-erial 11 is guided to the outside of the steamer body 1, leav-ing through the seal mechanism 3. Because the cloth material is caused to travel around the two generally spiral paths ~ ~
defined by the guide rolls 4 and the cloth driving rolls 4', ~ ~
it moves from one roll to another in a state substantially free of tension. Virtually no sag takes place between the rolls _ g _ .
, . , :
When carried by the upper faces of the rolls. On the other hand, although there is a tendency to sag when the cloth mat-erial moves below the lower faces of the rolls, it is prevented ~ ~
from sagging too much by the rolls that are arranged below ~ -that path. With the cloth material thus arranged to travel in a substantially no-tension state, even in cases where the cloth material being processed is a knitted material which tends easily to stretch, the material can continuously be processed under conditions of high moist-heat without impairing the bulki~
ness and feel of the material. Moreover, by constraining the - cloth material to follow two interwound spiral paths, first forwardly and then backwardly, the cloth material may stay in-side the steamer body for a sufficiently long period to allow an effective moist heat treatment thereof. Also, treatment chemicals may be contained in the reser~oir 6, as in the first-described embodiment.
.
'':
`':
Claims (12)
1. A method of processing cloth material in a high pressure steamer on a continuous basis, which method comprises feeding the cloth material continuously into the steamer body having hot, humid and pressurized atmosphere, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of guide members to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path within the steamer body, only one side of the cloth material contacting the guide members, reversing the direction of travel of the cloth material in the region of the centre of the spiral by means of reversing guide members, constraining the cloth material by an arrangement of further guide members to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral bath interwound with the first-mentioned generally spiral path, only the other side of the cloth material contacting the further guide members, and then continuously feeding the cloth material out of the steamer body.
2. A method as claimed in claim 1, in which the guide members and further guide members used comprise rolls which are rotatably mounted within the steamer body.
3. A method as claimed in claim 2, in which the cloth material is driven around said generally spiral paths by means of driving at least some of said rolls for rotation, to impart movement to the cloth material.
4. A method as claimed in claims 1, 2 or 3, in which the cloth material is passed through a reservoir of treatment liquid in the region of the reversal of the direction of travel of the cloth material.
5. A method as claimed in claims 1, 2 or 3, in which the reversing guide members used comprise a pair of opposed rotatable rolls.
6. A method as claimed in claims 1, 2 or 3, in which the cloth material is fed into the steamer and drawn out of the steamer respectively through roll seal mechanisms.
7. Apparatus for the continuous treatment of cloth material, which apparatus comprises a steamer having inlet and outlet openings, means sealing the inlet and outlet openings whilst allowing cloth material to be treated to pass there-through, an arrangement of guide members and further guide members within the steamer respectively defining two interwound generally spiral paths and reversing means in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths, so that a cloth material may be fed into the steamer body through the inlet opening, constrained to follow an inwardly directed generally spiral path by the guide members whilst only one side of the cloth material contacts the guide members, have the direction of travel reversed by the reversing means, constrained to follow an outwardly directed generally spiral path by the further guide members whilst only the other side of the cloth material contacts the further guide members and finally is fed out of the steamer body through the outlet opening.
8. Apparatus as claimed in claim 7 wherein the sealing means for the inlet and outlet openings each comprises a roll seal mechanism.
9. Apparatus as claimed in claim 7, wherein the guide members and further guide members comprise rolls rotatably mounted within the steamer.
10. Apparatus as claimed in claim 9, wherein at least some of the rolls are power-driven to cause constrained cloth material to travel along said spiral paths.
11. Apparatus as claimed in any of claims 7 to 9, wherein the reversing means comprise a pair of opposed rolls, rotatably mounted within the steamer.
12. Apparatus as claimed in any of claims 7 to 9, wherein a reservoir for treatment liquid is provided in the region of the centre of the two spiral paths and through which a support-ed cloth material passes.
Applications Claiming Priority (4)
| Application Number | Priority Date | Filing Date | Title |
|---|---|---|---|
| JPSHO51-154680 | 1976-12-22 | ||
| JP15468076A JPS5378376A (en) | 1976-12-22 | 1976-12-22 | Continuous print color developing method and apparatus |
| JPSHO52-6672 | 1977-01-24 | ||
| JP667277A JPS5394659A (en) | 1977-01-24 | 1977-01-24 | Continuous tensionless treating method for fabric within high pressure steamer |
Publications (1)
| Publication Number | Publication Date |
|---|---|
| CA1114111A true CA1114111A (en) | 1981-12-15 |
Family
ID=26340859
Family Applications (1)
| Application Number | Title | Priority Date | Filing Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| CA286,907A Expired CA1114111A (en) | 1976-12-22 | 1977-09-16 | Method and apparatus for continuously processing various kinds of cloth materials in a high pressure steamer for multipurpose treatments |
Country Status (5)
| Country | Link |
|---|---|
| BR (1) | BR7707106A (en) |
| CA (1) | CA1114111A (en) |
| DE (1) | DE2752057A1 (en) |
| GB (1) | GB1577686A (en) |
| IT (1) | IT1085990B (en) |
Families Citing this family (2)
| Publication number | Priority date | Publication date | Assignee | Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| JPH0788618B2 (en) * | 1990-10-19 | 1995-09-27 | ワイケイケイ株式会社 | Steamer for long objects |
| DE19750573C1 (en) * | 1997-11-14 | 1999-02-11 | Kuesters Eduard Maschf | Spiral fabric steamer |
-
1977
- 1977-09-16 CA CA286,907A patent/CA1114111A/en not_active Expired
- 1977-09-21 IT IT2776077A patent/IT1085990B/en active
- 1977-10-25 BR BR7707106A patent/BR7707106A/en unknown
- 1977-11-22 DE DE19772752057 patent/DE2752057A1/en active Pending
- 1977-12-14 GB GB5196877A patent/GB1577686A/en not_active Expired
Also Published As
| Publication number | Publication date |
|---|---|
| DE2752057A1 (en) | 1978-06-29 |
| BR7707106A (en) | 1978-08-01 |
| IT1085990B (en) | 1985-05-28 |
| GB1577686A (en) | 1980-10-29 |
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| Date | Code | Title | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| MKEX | Expiry |