Zimmer Colaris : Now Possible To Print Any Colour On A Woven Rug
Using Zimmer’s penetration booster system, the ink saturates the fibres all the way to the back of the carpet.
Up till now, most printed carpet has been wall-to-wall tufted carpeting with a pattern printed on it. This kind of carpet does not resemble a woven rug at all. No pattern is visible on the back of the carpet, and the secondary backing makes the carpet quite stiff. In contrast, woven rugs are soft and pliable and show the pattern on the back.
When it comes to quality and durability, woven carpets are clearly superior. The pile row density of a tufted carpet is rather limited: 8 pile rows / inch (315 pile rows / metre) is the norm; woven rugs can have 1000 pile rows / metre or more. The difference in pile tufts per square metre is even greater: 99,255 versus 1,000,000 pile tufts / m².
Another big disadvantage of tufted carpet is that it is not recyclable. It consists of too many different materials: pile yarn, backing fabric, secondary backing – these are all different materials. Woven carpets can be made entirely from a single material – e.g. polyester yarn – so they are easy to recycle. This is completely in line with the current “cradle-to-cradle” trend.
If the right weave structure is used for a woven carpet, for example a W-binding, the pile fixation is so good that no back coating is needed to hold the pile tufts in place. (The more commonly used V-binding for Jacquard woven rugs requires a light latex coating.)
Greige material, as the undyed substrate for printed carpet is often called, can be woven on any machine with a 3-position Jacquard, such as the Stäubli ALPHA 500 series. ALPHA 500 machines provide weaving widths up to 5.3m and can produce a variety of different W‑structures. Pile row densities of 1,000 per metre or more are possible, and any common pile yarn material can be used. Printing is normally done on nylon or on much cheaper polyester yarn, but wool, cotton and viscose can also be used. Printing on polypropylene yarn is not possible yet.
The most basic W-structure, requiring just one pile frame, is a 3/6W structure. For a firmer back, a “stuffer thread” can be incorporated into the back of the carpet. This stuffer can be made of cheap waste material. For a higher pile row density, or when using thin pile yarn, the same weave structure can be used with three pile frames. This gives a very fine pile distribution when the pile tufts are offset by two wefts. With just two pile frames, a symmetrical 3/8W structure gives the best results. This structure is also very suitable for shaggy carpets with high pile.
Both pile threads may be in the same reed dent or divided over two adjacent reed dents. Using four pile frames, the efficiency of the weave structure can be doubled. The pile threads can all be drawn into the same reed dent or divided over two or four dents. All structures can be woven on a Stäubli ALPHA 500 LEANTEC machine as well. This carpet machine without a Jacquard is very suitable for plain carpets like greige material.
ALPHA 500 LEANTEC carpet weaving machine
This machine is equipped with a Stäubli UNIVAL 500 servo-controlled dobby with up to 16 shafts. Because there is no Jacquard mounted on top of the machine, it requires less headroom; it will fit in buildings where a standard carpet machine would not fit.
Does printing hold the future? It might, considering the current rapid improvements in quality. The advantages are clear: There is no need to stock yarns in all different colours, switching from one design or from one colour palette to another is a matter of seconds, and even orders for single carpets can be taken. But one thing is clear: Rugs, whether Jacquard or printed, should be woven. The difference in price compared with tufted carpet is minimal – and the quality is vastly superior.
