DK154306B - NON-WOVEN FLOORING - Google Patents

Abstract

1. Non-woven floor covering (1) having a surface layer of mutually parallel thick fibre strands (4) of untwisted or twisted fibre material (6) and with a fibrous backing 5 layer (2), in which the fibre strands (4) are present without mutual attachment transverse to their longitudinal directions and are passively needled to the backing layer (2) by retaining threads (5) originating from that backing layer, characterised in that the retaining threads (5) originating from the backing layer (2) extend in a manner which is invisible from outside into the strands (4) at the most up to that part of the periphery of the strands (4) which is furthest from the backing layer (2) and within the strands (4) they are present in a folded-back form terminating in an end portion (5') which extends towards the backing layer (2).

Description

DK 154306 B

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION The invention relates to a nonwoven floor covering having a top layer consisting of thick parallel strands of non-twisted or twisted fiber material and with a support layer, in which the fiber strands exist without intersection across their longitudinal direction and are passively bonded to the support layer by using holding fibers derived from the support layer.

From BE Patent Specification No. 700,540 a floor covering of this kind is known in which yarn strands lie parallel to one another in a layer and are joined by needling to a support layer in the form of a textile fiber layer, and where the holding fibers connecting the two layers originate from subgrade.

In this known floor covering, the retaining fibers originating from the support layer are needled completely through the layers formed by the parallel strands of yarn so that they protrude above the top of the coating and thus remain open in the upper layer. This causes them to be exposed to wear, which degrades the strength of the upper layer, as its yarn strands easily slip from the worn needle fibers and thus become detached from the supporting fibrous tissue.

Non-woven floor coverings are known (eg DE-OS 26 04 098), in which at least one layer of textile yarns arranged parallel to one another is the same as one from the yarn side with a support layer derived from the yarns. Since this sewing is done by the fibers of yarns, i.e. from the top of the floor covering, only a minor portion of each yarn's fibers of insufficient density coincide with the support layer due to the danger of destroying the twisted yarns and hence their appearance. As a needle density, this German publication specification indicates a needle stitch density of 0.3-6 stitches / cm. This results in an insufficient strength of the yarn layer at the support layer for many purposes, which, by damaging the yarn fibers from the yarn, can result in loosening of the yarn layer and thus damaging the upper surface of the floor covering by using the floor covering. If, on the basis of this known method, a needle with a higher density will be carried out, this leads to a flat felt-like deformed structure, to which it is not worthwhile to use single yarns, although a structured appearance can be obtained. Therefore, these known coatings do not meet the requirements set and are limited to yarns that allow one

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In addition, sections with a further yarn layer over the first yarn layer, by these known coatings, simply lead to an extra pattern.

Furthermore, it is known (e.g. DE-OS 19 17 848) to make non-woven blankets of two layers of yarns of a thickness of e.g.

20 ktex where the two layers of yarn cross each other and are connected to each other by needle and e.g. moreover, needles are attached to a base layer. The crossed layer of yarns is needled from the yarn side, i.e. that the yarns are actively needled for the support layer, and furthermore two layers of yarns are required, so that the yarn layers are also pressed together here with needle none of the yarns.

The object of the invention is therefore to provide a non-woven floor covering of the kind mentioned above, which does not have the disadvantages of the known coatings, and with the aid of the fiber material at its upper side is clearly structured e.g. handwoven appearance, and whose fiber-fed needles are secured sufficiently securely to a support layer in such a way that, regardless of the attachment method, a e.g. elevated structure.

In a coating of the kind mentioned above, this task according to the invention is solved by the fact that the holding fibers originating from the support layer, without being visible from the outside, extend at most into the strings to the furthest part of the support layer and to the interior of the strings. are bent with an end portion towards the support layer.

The strings are mutually unrelated, so that, by bending or bending the flooring towards the support layer, they can be spaced apart without impairing or straining their attachment to the support layer. In this way, the floor covering gets e.g. an agility that cannot be achieved e.g. by needle felt and can also not be obtained by the aforementioned floor coatings known from BE Patent No. 700,540, so that e.g. may have similar properties as with tufted or woven rugs. Because of the passively penetrating retaining fibers of the invention which may be under tension or dissolved in the strands, e.g. also a compression of the strings and thus a compressed flat product, such as e.g. can occur by needling from above as already described in the discussion of the floor coverings known from DE-OS No. 26 04 098.

Preferably, the strands are attached by a conventional needling process in which fibers of the support layer are gripped by needles and as needle fibers, i.e. such as holding fibers are fed into the strings 3

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and thus passively needle them. The support layer is thereby actively needled preferably by means of its own retaining fibers.

In the following, the term "active needle" is understood to mean that a fiber layer's fibers are moved by a needle process relative to other fibers in the fiber layer, e.g. pulled out and intertwined with each other, i.e. can actively cause something. They can be inserted into a second layer adjacent to the fiber layer so that the second layer is connected to the fiber layer. By the term "passively needle" or "passively attached", on the other hand, it is to be understood that in a non-fibrous material layer, such as retaining fibers, there are fibers of another fibrous layer, but that the fibers of the material layer including it are essentially not used for active purposes but remain passive. In this connection, reference is also made to CH-PS 206,493. Due to the passively needled strands for the support layer, e.g. the needle stitches are made from the underside of the support layer and the coating and therefore cannot be seen from the top of the coating. The strings can therefore be needled using a so-called "blind stitch technique", i.e. an invisible technique from the active needle-resistant support layer, so that they e.g. do not wear when using the coating, and the top of the floor covering e.g. therefore, severe wear cannot be damaged or altered.

Depending on the species e.g. of the strands, the desired coating or the desired or required strength, the strands may be needled from the support layer side with a needle density of 20-200 stitches / cm. Because of the string thickness of e.g. more than 5 mm is e.g. not only a high needle density possible, but there may also be floor coverings with a weight of e.g. 0.5-8 kg / m2.

In the case of the floor covering according to the invention, preferably with a single layer of strings already a thick product is possible, in which the strings can be clearly elevated and e.g. appears as one from the bottom, i.e. from the support layer, elevated three-dimensional construction. Pre-making a pattern is unnecessary. Instead, the strings can be placed individually and e.g. in a desired pattern on the support layer, whereby not only the placement of the strings on the support layer but also many different patterns or structures and changes thereof are possible.

The only retaining fibers penetrating into the strands may be bent in part in the direction of the strings in the direction towards the support layer.

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to reverse V shape or to loop or loop shape. By means of this bending, the retaining fibers with one end can be hooked together with the fibers of the strings and thus fixed in them. Thus, by means of the other end of the retaining fibers which are in the support layer, the strands are firmly connected to the support layer, and e.g. in the case of a loop-shaped bend, both ends may be anchored to the support layer.

Due to the thickness of the strands, these are retained by the retaining fibers at several places over the cross-section and are thus maintained with great uniformity. The strings can have a fineness of 10-100 ktex. The retaining fibers may be penetrated into the strands over only a portion of their thickness, e.g. half the thickness, or over the entire thickness of a strand, to the portion away from the support layer from the periphery of the strand. Thus, the strings are sufficiently securely attached to the support layer. This, therefore, also enables a high density of the retaining fibers and thus a passive sear pressing, which advantageously can achieve a high strength and uniformity of the fastening.

The strings can be of any shape or configuration, e.g. a circular or substantially circular, an elliptical, a rectangular, a square or a triangular cross-section. They may contain or consist of natural fibers or synthetic fibers, fiber-reinforced plastics or adhered fibers or threads.

The strands may also have different diameters, and groups of strings of the same diameter may be present along with groups of strings of other diameters.

The strands may be ribbon or yarn-like, e.g. coarse structures, and preferably held together by fixation independently. The strands may be spun during twisting or contain fibers which may be present around a core, e.g. a fiber core. They may be wrapped cylindrical or helical around the core.

For non-twisted strings, i.e. by strings of non-twisted fibers, the fixation can be achieved by a wrapping or binding yarn or by the aforementioned bonding of the fibers or threads, e.g. by means of binders introduced from the support layer side and from there can penetrate the strands, i.e. eg. be treated by so-called slop padding or by soaking.

In one embodiment, the strands may be wrapped with a 2 visible finer binding yarn with e.g. up to 200 turns / m, thereby giving the appearance of a chain imitation. It should be noted that 5

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by the known hand-woven rugs, chains of yarn are clearly visible against it e.g. coarse wool yarn or loose wool and is a quality feature of the rug. In the case of the floor covering according to the invention, with the aid of the yarn, a look like a hand-woven floor covering which is obtained by hand-woven carpets by means of the chains can be obtained quite surprisingly, without being present here. Thus, it can be avoided that the floor covering will have the same appearance as a soft floor covering, but instead will get the same appearance as a hand-woven floor covering.

In another embodiment, each strand may have contracted strings, by means of a wrap thread, thereby obtaining an appearance as a tufting loop imitation. The wrapping wire is twisted during manufacture of the string with tension around it, so that it can displace inwardly into the string and appears to be corre- spondingly twisted by the string. Considering the string, this one appears as deflected in the longitudinal direction of the string and as enclosed by the string itself. The binding or wrapping yarn is therefore e.g. essentially no longer visible as such, and the fibers of the strands can be plastic and e.g. loop-shaped bulge, so that e.g. a height / depth structure is obtained, i.e. a relief-like structure. The tying yarn can have a fineness of 100-8000 dtex, and the tension in the fabrication of the string is preferably below the tearing power of the tying yarn. At a fineness of e.g. 4000 dtex, the voltage is preferably less than 20 kg.

The manufacture of the floor covering according to the invention requires a precise needling of the retaining fibers from the support layer into the strands. This happens e.g. with needles allowing both gripping and unobstructed release of the e.g. formed by barbs or recesses in the needles, grasping retaining fibers at the retraction of the needles from the strands so that the retaining fibers lie in the interior of the strings with their bent end. Needle none can be done with so-called sealing needles (eg, Information Supplement F01A, Singer Filznadeln). Below, e.g. the distances between the needle barbs and e.g. stitch depth and / or stitch density, e.g. one of the barbs can grasp fibers individually or in bundles, and how deep and at what distance from each other these can be introduced into the strands and placed into them e.g. in the form of a loop. In addition, the latter is e.g. depending on the stacking length of the carrier layer fiber material. Using e.g. appropriate placement of the needles in the needle board and placement of the strands e.g. next to each other at intervals can

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The carrier layer may contain or consist of natural or synthetic fibers and may be a nonwoven structure, e.g. a fibrous web, a fiber-bound product or just a fiber layer. On the side facing away from the strands of the support layer, a backing layer, e.g. a usual covering of flooring, e.g. a resilient backing layer to form the coating in accordance with the desired requirements. The floor covering may be in the form of a flat construction, e.g. in web form or as unit, plate or tile.

The invention will be explained in more detail below with reference to the exemplary embodiments shown in the drawing. In the drawing:

FIG. 1 is a schematic perspective view of a floor covering; i ng in section, fig. 2 is a sectional view taken along line II-II of FIG. 1, FIG. 3 is a schematic sectional view of another floor covering; FIG. 4 is a photographic view of the upper side of a further floor covering; and FIG. 5 is a schematic side view of a portion of a string of the floor covering shown in FIG. 4.

According to FIG. 1 and 2 have a nonwoven floor covering 1, e.g. a blanket, a carrier layer 2 of fibrous material 3 and on top of this, substantially parallel to one another, fiber-containing thick strands 4 having a thickness D (Fig. 2) of more than 5 mm. The fiber material 3 is twisted, giving each strand 4 an inherent strength. The support layer 3 is actively joined to the strings 4, i.e. that the strings 4 are secured to the support layer by means of holding fibers 5 originating from the support layer 2, which in turn means that the strands are passively sealed with the support layer. The holding fibers 5 extend only into the strings 4 and, as shown in the right part of FIG. 2, to or substantially to the periphery 6 of the strings 4 and a portion of the periphery 6, respectively, facing away from the support layer 2. As shown in an embodiment in the left part of FIG. 2, the retaining fibers 5 can also only penetrate into the strings 4 over a portion of the thickness D and extend over half or less than half the thickness D / 2. The penetration depth of the retaining fibers 5 is e.g. depending on the needling conditions

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and / or the stack length of the carrier material 2's fibrous materials. The holding fibers 5 are bent in the portion 7 which is penetrated only by the strings 4 and thus may be rigidly hooked and thus secured in the fiber material of the strings 4. The un-bent fiber portion 7 may be the island of fiber end or a fiber loop if two free loop ends 10 are still in the carrier 2. This depends on the length, e.g. of the staple length of the fiber material 3, or of the fiber portion present at the needle precisely at the needle. For the sake of clarity, the bent fiber portions are legally shown at a greater angle of inclination than the ten reality, i.e. that the bent parts are in fact closer to each other.

The stitches which are made from the underside 11 of the carrier 1 and thus of the floor covering are not visible from the floor surface -T's upper side 13, when the joint of the carrier 2 with the strings 4 is made.

Therefore, since a needle is made from the support layer 2 and the retaining fibers 5 simply penetrate the strings 4, the upper surface 13 of the floor covering 1 is therefore also free of retaining fibers 5.

The strings 4 are sufficiently adhered to the support layer 2 by means of the retaining fibers 5, since needles have not been made at a large number of needle locations corresponding to the stitches 12. For the manufacture, the strings 4 can be applied individually to the support layer 2 and be unrelated across their longitudinal direction L, so that during opening of the spaces between the strings 4, the floor covering 1 can be bent transversely of the longitudinal direction L and thus is flexible in a transverse direction.

In a floor covering 1 according to FIG. 3, non-twisted strings 4 are also passively needle to a support layer 2 by means of retaining fibers 5, which originate from the fiber material of the support layer 2. The actively needled support layer 2 is thus connected to the strands 4. Here, too, the retaining fibers 5 penetrate only a bit. the strands 4 and at most to the periphery thereof, without the fiber material 7 of the strings 4 being used in any way for the needle process. Thus, the floor covering 1 is here also completely free or substantially free of retaining fibers 5 protruding from the top surface of the coating. A cover layer 8 is attached to the underside of the support layer 2. The strings 4 of non-twisted fibrous material are wrapped by a tying yarn 9 so that they are independently held together.

FIG. 4 shows the top of a floor covering J with strings which, which is not seen, but is described in connection with those in fig. 1 8

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and 2, are passively needled with retaining fibers from a fibrous support layer, the fibers of the support layer acting as retaining fibers 5 being merely penetrated into the strings 4 and thus being passively needled. The strings 4 consist of a non-twisted fiber material and are wrapped by a twine in such a way that the strands 4 are pulled together in their longitudinal direction and have strings 10, whereby the twine is correct and invisible. Thereby, as seen, an appearance can be obtained as a tufting loop imitation.

FIG. 5 shows a string 4 which, when stretched in its longitudinal direction E, is pulled out, so that the reciprocal wrap between the twine 9 and the string 4 is visible. Upon lifting the tension, the tensioned binder 9 pulls the string 4 together in such a way that its constricted parts appear as beads on a string (Fig. 4). Therefore, the string 4 has a longitudinal elasticity E obtained by the tension of the tie yarn during the manufacture of the string and the resulting apparent overstretching.

Claims (16)

A non-woven floor covering (1) having an upper layer consisting of thick, parallel fiber strands (4) of non-woven or twisted fibrous material (8} and with a fibrous supporting member (2), and with which the fiber strands (4) are unobstructed across their longitudinal direction and are passively bonded to the support layer (2) by means of holding fibers (5) which originate from the support egg (2), characterized in that the holding fibers (2) originating from the support layer (2) 5) without being visible from the outside at most extends into the strings (4) to the furthest part of the support layer of the periphery of each strand (4), and in the interior of the strands are bent with an end portion (5 ') towards the support layer ( 2)) ' Floor covering according to claim 1, characterized in that the retaining fibers (5) extend only one piece corresponding to half the thickness of the string into the strands (4). Flooring according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that the welded fibers (5) penetrating the strands (4) are bent into a hook shape, e.g. for bar shape, n shape, reverse V shape or for loop or loop shape. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strings (4) have a thickness of at least 5 mm, e.g. over 20 mm. Flooring according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strings (4) have a circular or substantially circular, an elliptical, a rectangular, a square or a triangular cross-section. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strings have different diameters. Flooring according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strings (4) have a twist (Fig. 1). Flooring according to any one of claims 1-6, characterized in that each strand (4) is enclosed by a visibly finer binding yarn (9), thereby providing an appearance as a chain imitation. DK 154306 B Flooring according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strands (4) contain fibers wrapped around a core, e.g. a fiber core. Flooring according to claim 9, characterized in that the fibers of the strands (4) are wound in a cylindrical or helical form around the core. Flooring according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that each strand (4) has compressed strings (9) by means of a longitudinally extending yarn (9) and thus appears as a tufting imitation. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the support layer (2) is seamed with the strings (4) with a needle density of up to 200 2 stitches / cm. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the strands (4) contain natural or synthetic fibers, fiber-reinforced plastics or glued fibers or threads. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that it has a weight of 0.5-8 kg / mZ. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the support layer (2) is a non-woven product. Floor covering according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the support layer (2) is actively needled by means of the own holding fibers (5) derived from this.