FIELD OF APPLICATION – TEXTILE INDUSTRY

The textile industry processes natural and synthetic fibres into yarn, woven fabrics, knitted fabrics and nonwovens. Its products are used in clothing, home textiles, the automotive industry, healthcare and construction – from garments through hygiene and filtration materials to geotextiles.

As customers' demands for product safety grow (particularly in clothing and hygiene applications) and with the arrival of mandatory textile recycling in the EU, the importance of magnetic separation and metal detection is rising too. A metal contaminant in textiles means damaged machinery, a fire risk and a hazard to the end customer.

Did you know…? Clothing brands apply a so-called broken needle policy to their suppliers. Every fragment of a sewing needle must be tracked down, and if it cannot be found, the entire batch of products must pass through a metal detector.

Introducing a magnetic separator and metal detector into textile production protects carding, needle-punching and tearing machines, reduces the fire risk and ensures the safety of products for the end customer. This has a positive impact on profitability and production efficiency.

WHERE IN THE TEXTILE INDUSTRY WILL YOU FIND OUR MAGNETIC SEPARATORS?

Fibre preparation – bale opening and cleaning lines

Natural and synthetic fibres arrive at spinning mills in pressed bales fixed with steel wires or straps. During opening, wire fragments get into the fibre flow, and with cotton there are also metal parts from harvesting machines. Fibres are conveyed pneumatically between machines – and it is precisely the pipeline routes that are the ideal place for separation.

The following equipment is most commonly used in fibre preparation:

Tufts of fibres behave much like pulp in paper mills – conventional grate separators with magnetic rods would clog with fibres immediately. That is why we install ML-P chute magnets in the pipeline routes of cleaning lines: the magnets are placed on doors along the sides of the pipe, so no obstacle stands in the way of the fibre flow. Non-magnetic metals are revealed by a metal detector for pneumatic conveying, which automatically rejects the contaminated tuft of fibres with a diverter – without stopping the line.

The same principle has also proved itself with very specific lightweight materials: at a major Czech processor of feathers for making duvets and pillows, two ML 200 N magnetic separators connected directly into the pipeline system clean the pneumatically conveyed feathers.

What problems it solves: wire fragments from bales in the fibre flow = fire risk and damage to downstream machines. Benefit for the customer: protection of the entire spinning mill by a single separation point at the inlet and a fundamental reduction of the fire risk.

Carding – protection of carding machines

A carding machine combs fibres into a fine web and is one of the most sensitive and expensive machines in a spinning mill. Its rollers are fitted with fine wire clothing, which a hard metal particle damages irreversibly.

The following equipment is most commonly used in carding:

ML magnetic separators are installed in chutes and shafts immediately before the carding machine – again, there must be no obstacle in the fibre flow that would cause clogging. As a second stage of protection there is a plate metal detector placed under the feed belt, which reveals even non-magnetic metals and stops the machine before the metal reaches the wire clothing.

What problems it solves: destroyed wire clothing of carding rollers = hours of downtime and unnecessary maintenance costs. Benefit for the customer: significantly longer clothing life, lower maintenance costs and smooth yarn production.

Production of nonwovens

Nonwovens for hygiene, healthcare, filtration or the automotive industry are made on needle looms and calenders. The greatest enemy here is broken needles from needle looms – hard, small and worked directly into the textile web. Relying on magnets under the belt alone is not enough: a fast-moving textile can pull the needle back out of the magnet.

The following equipment is most commonly used in nonwovens production:

The METRON 05 ProfiLine plate metal detector is developed directly for textile lines: it is installed horizontally under the textile web (or vertically) with a detection width of up to 12 metres and reliably detects metals even at a belt speed of up to 30 m/s. Thanks to its minimal metal-free zone, it can easily be integrated into an existing line.

The multi-segment METRON 04 ProfiLine additionally determines in which segment across the width of the web the metal is located – so the operator finds and removes it within moments.

What problems it solves: broken needles worked into the textile = damaged calenders and complaints from customers in the hygiene and automotive segments. Benefit for the customer: demonstrable cleanliness of every roll of textile and fast localisation of metal without long downtime.