Patent Grant
11352722
This application is a national stage application of and claims priority to, PCT/SE2017/050516, filed on May 17, 2017, which claims priority to Swedish application no. 1650668-5, filed on May 17, 2016. The entireties of both applications are incorporated by reference herein.
The present invention relates to a system for in-line treatment of thread for use with a thread consuming device.
It has been suggested to provide thread consuming devices, such as embroidery machines or the like, with in-line apparatuses designed to provide the thread with a certain treatment. Such in-line apparatuses could e.g. be used to colour the thread, whereby multiple colour nozzles could replace the current use of multiple pre-coloured threads when producing multi-coloured patterns.
When a nozzle is arranged to colour a thread passing by the droplet will hit the thread at a specific circumferential position. Due to the specific properties of the thread and of the colouring substance it cannot be assured that the colour substance will bleed around the entire circumference of the thread. Hence, an uneven colouring is achieved.
In view of this there is a need for an improved system for in-line treatment of thread, addressing the disadvantages mentioned above.
According to a first aspect a system for in-line treatment of at least one thread is provided. The system is configured to be used with a thread consuming device and comprises a treatment unit having a plurality of nozzles arranged at different positions relative the at least one thread, said at least one thread being in motion in use, each nozzle being configured to dispense one or more coating substances onto the at least one thread when activated; and at least one thread engagement device configured to rotate the at least one thread along its longitudinal axis as the at least one thread moves through said treatment unit.
One of said at least one thread engagement devices may be arranged on a downstream side of the treatment unit along the travel direction of the at least one thread.
Said at least one thread engagement device may be configured to apply a torque to said at least one thread in order to initiate a rotation of the at least one thread.
Said engagement device may comprise an engagement surface which, when in contact with said at least one thread, provides a rotation of said at least one thread.
In an embodiment said at least one thread engagement device is a guiding member.
One of said at least one thread engagement device may be moveable in order to control the rotation of the at least one thread along its longitudinal axis.
Said at least one thread engagement device may be one or more tubular members through which the at least one thread is guided.
In an embodiment one tubular member is arranged on a downstream side of said treatment unit, and/or one tubular member is arranged on an upstream side of said treatment unit.
The inner diameter of said tubular member may be selected such that the inner walls of said tubular member will apply a friction force to said at least one thread.
Said tubular member may be rotatable along its longitudinal axis.
In an embodiment said at least one thread engagement device comprises a rotating engagement member having an outer surface on which the at least one thread is guided for providing a rotation.
The system may further comprise at least one thread guiding member arranged downstream and/or upstream the at least one thread engagement device.
The nozzles may be inkjet nozzles, and the coating substance may be a colouring substance.
According to a second aspect a thread consuming device is provided. The device comprises a thread consuming unit and a system according to the first aspect.
The thread consuming unit may be an embroidery unit, a sewing unit, a knitting unit, or a weaving unit.
According to a third aspect, a method for providing a system for in-line treatment of thread is provided. The method comprises providing a treatment unit having a plurality of nozzles arranged at different longitudinal positions along the thread, each nozzle being configured to dispense a coating substance onto the thread when activated; and providing a thread engagement device configured to rotate the thread along its longitudinal axis as the thread moves through said treatment unit.
According to a fourth aspect, a method for providing treatment to at least one thread prior to being fed to a thread consuming device is provided. The method comprises feeding the at least one thread such that it engages with at least one thread engagement device whereby the at least one thread causes to rotate along its longitudinal axis, and passing the at least one thread through a treatment unit having a plurality of nozzles arranged at different positions relative the at least one thread, each nozzle being configured to dispense one or more coating substances onto the at least one thread when activated.
Thread consumption unit is in this context is any apparatus which in use consumes thread. It may e.g. be an embroidery machine, weaving machine, sewing machine or knitting machine, or any other thread consuming apparatus which may benefit from a surface treatment or coating or any other process involving subjecting the thread to a substance, such as dying.
Treatment is in this context is any process designed to cause a change of the properties of a thread. Such processes include, but are not limited to, colouring, wetting, lubrication, cleaning, etc.
Thread is in this context is a flexible elongate member or substrate, being thin in width and height direction, and having a longitudinal extension being significantly greater than the longitudinal extension of any parts of the system described herein, as well as than its width and height dimensions. Typically, a thread may consist of a plurality of plies being twisted together. The term thread thus includes a yarn, wire, strand, filament, etc. made of various different materials such as glass fibre, wool, cotton, synthetic materials such as polymers, metals, or e.g. a mixture of wool, cotton, polymer, or metal.
Ply is in this context is a flexible member forming part of a thread. A ply typically consists of several filaments being twisted together. For creating a balanced thread, i.e. a thread having no or very little tendency to twist upon itself, the plies and the filaments may in some cases be twisted in opposite direction.
Within this specification, all references to upstream and/or downstream should be interpreted as relative positions during normal operation of the thread consumption device, i.e. when the device is operating to treat an elongated substrate, such as a thread, continuously moving through the device in a normal operating direction. Hence, an upstream component is arranged such that a specific part of the thread passes it before it passes a downstream component.
Embodiments of the invention will be described in the following description of the present invention; reference being made to the appended drawings which illustrate non-limiting examples of how the inventive concept can be reduced into practice.
An idea of the present invention is to provide a system and method for distributing a coating substance onto a thread in a controlled manner, for use in association with a thread consumption unit to form a thread consumption device. The thread consumption unit may e.g. be an embroidery machine, weaving machine, sewing machine or knitting machine. More particularly, a general object is to allow for a precise dispensing onto the thread at defined circumferential positions around the thread which is advantageous as such precise dispensing will allow for a very accurate positioning of the coating substance onto the thread. For example, it will be possible to obtain specific colouring patterns onto the thread.
A system 10 for in-line treatment of thread 20 for use with a thread consumption device 100, including a thread consumption unit 90 such as an embroidery machine, is schematically shown in
The system 10 comprises a treatment unit 30 being configured to dispense a coating substance, such as ink, onto the thread 20 when the treatment unit 30 is activated. A control unit 40 is connected to the treatment unit 30 for controlling the operation of the treatment unit 30 as will be further described below. A thread engagement device 50 is provided downstream the treatment unit 10 for causing a rotation of the thread 20 such that the thread 20 will rotate as it passes the treatment unit 30 as indicated by the curved arrow in
Due to the fact that the thread 20 rotates while passing the treatment unit 30 it is possible to provide a more even treatment of the thread 20 around its periphery, which thereby increases the quality of the treatment. The solution of arranging a thread rotating unit, i.e. the thread engagement device 50, downstream the treatment unit 30 may be particularly advantageous for in-line colouring systems utilizing inkjet technology, i.e. a system where the treatment unit 30 comprises several inkjet nozzles. In such application the inkjet nozzles may be aligned in a direction towards the thread 20 and the thread 20 may be coloured at several positions along its longitudinal extension. As the thread 20 rotates the dispensed droplets will hit the thread 20 at specific circumferential positions whereby a more even colouring will be provided.
The thread engagement device 50 could be realized in many different ways, e.g. as a static (or fixed) structure, or as a dynamic and controllable structure. In the following some of these alternatives will be discussed in more detail.
Common for all examples is that the thread engagement device 50 ensures a rotation of the thread 20, i.e. the thread 20 rotates while passing the treatment unit 30.
In one embodiment, as is shown in
When the thread 20 comes into contact with the guiding member 52, which is positioned such that the thread 20 is urged to be guided by it, the guiding member 52 will apply a force to the engagement surface 51 due to the thread tension. This force will urge the thread 20 to rotate until there is equilibrium between the torque resulting from the applied force, the intrinsic twist of the thread 20, and the downstream movement of the thread 20. More specifically the applied torque is a result by the friction at the engagement surface 51, the asymmetrical configuration of the thread 20, and the thread movement. Due to the friction the thread 20 will be urged to rotate so that the contact area between the thread 20 and the engagement surface 51 is maximized. This is shown by the dashed lines in
Hence, in its most simple form the thread engagement device 50 is a static guiding member 52 having an engagement surface 51 contacting the thread 20 as the thread 20 passes by the engagement surface 51. It would however be possible to add a controllable functionality to the thread engagement device 50, e.g. by arranging the guiding member 52 on a movable stage (not shown) whereby the position of the guiding member 52 will affect the force applied to the thread 20 and thus controlling the rotation of the thread 20 under the thread treatment unit 30.
In
The tubular member 54 is connected to a rotational driver (not shown) which is capable of rotating the tubular member 54 along its longitudinal axis. When activated the thread 20 will consequently rotate with the tubular member 54, whereby an upstream rotation of the thread 20 is accomplished. For this to happen, the inner diameter of the tubular member 54 is selected such that the inner walls of the tubular member 54 apply a friction force to the thread 20.
For the embodiments described with reference to
In
Again referring to
So far the system 10 comprising the thread engagement device(s) 50 has only been described to engage with a single thread 20. However, it has been shown that the proposed system can also be used for a plurality of threads 20. These threads 20 may e.g. be twisted to form a thread bundle, whereby the treatment unit 30 ensures an even colouring around the circumference of the entire thread bundle. The multiple threads may be separated further downstream, or remain in a bundled state for later processes.
Optionally the threads may be fed to the thread engagement device(s) 50 in a separated state, whereby the threads are running more or less in parallel through the system. When the threads are in contact with the thread engagement device a rotation occur, not only for each thread per se but also for the entire bundle of threads. Hence, the threads will twist around each other immediately upstream the thread engagement device 50, but again separated downstream the thread engagement device 50. This phenomenon applies e.g. for the thread engagement devices shown in
Now turning to
For a colouring operation the control unit 40 receives one or more input signals specifying the desired colour and/or colouring effect. The colour input preferably includes information regarding the exact colour, as well as the longitudinal start and stop positions of the thread 20 for that particular colour. The longitudinal start and stop position could be represented by specific times if the thread speed is determined. The colouring effect input preferably includes pattern information, e.g. if an even colouring is desired. Normally, a homogenous colouring would require coating on different circumferential positions in a close, or even the same, longitudinal range of the thread. On the other hand, a one-sided colouring effect would require coating on a single circumferential position only. Based on the knowledge that the thread 20 has a certain rotation, or twist per length unit, it is possible to precisely dispense the coating substance at different circumferential positions of the thread 20 as the thread 20 passes by the treatment unit 30. By multiplying the twist per length unit with the speed of the thread 20 it is possible to obtain the twist rate, i.e. the rotational or twist angle per second. For example, if the twist per length unit is 360°/cm and the speed of the thread 20 is 2 cm/s, the resulting twist rate is 720°/s, i.e. two 360° revolutions per second. The twist rate may be used to calculate an activation timing required for each nozzle 32a-g such that each nozzle 32a-g can dispense the coating substance such that the coating substance will hit the thread 20 on a unique circumferential position of the thread 20. It should be appreciated that the twist of the thread 20 relates to a rotation of the thread 20 seen by an observer as the thread is moving in a longitudinal direction. Optionally the thread may also have a native twist, e.g. formed by the helical appearance of a multi-ply thread. When the helically arranged plies pass a fix longitudinal position it will appear as if the thread rotates with reference to the fix longitudinal position. In another embodiment, if the thread comprises only one ply or plies arranged in parallel along the longitudinal extension thereof, the twist or rotation is entirely produced by the thread engagement device 50.
The important factor for achieving a desired treatment of the thread 20 is that the thread 20 rotates when it passes the treatment unit 30, so that the activation of the nozzles 32a-g of the treatment unit 30 can be controlled to dispense coating substance at unique circumferential positions of the thread 20 in use. This however also requires a specific distance between the nozzles 32a-g in order to achieve the desired treatment effect.
The activation timing can also be based on the knowledge of the longitudinal distance d1 between each of the plurality of nozzles 32a-g. For example, it is possible to dispense a coating substance onto a thread 20 at the same longitudinal position and at two chosen circumferential positions, such as 0° and 180°, by knowing the longitudinal distance d1 between the respective nozzles 32a-g. For example, if the longitudinal distance between a first and a second nozzle 32a-g is 5 mm, giving the example above, it will take 0.25 seconds (5 mm/(2 cm/s)) for a specific position of the thread 20 to move from the first nozzle 32a-g to the second nozzle 32a-g. In 0.25 seconds the thread 20 has twisted 180° (720°/s*0.25 s). Hence, in this case the activation timing may be calculated such that the first nozzle is activated at time zero, and the second nozzle is activated 0.25 seconds after time zero. The control unit 40 has processing capabilities and may comprise a processor with memory. The control unit 40 may receive input relating to a twist level parameter associated with the level of twist, e.g. twist angle per length unit of the thread 20 and a speed level parameter associated with the speed of the thread 20 passing through the treatment unit 30 in use. The input may be received via another device, e.g. a sensor, graphical user interface (not shown). Alternatively the input may be hard coded into the control unit 40.
The control unit 40 may be further arranged to transmit a control signal to the treatment unit 30. The control signal sent by the control unit to the treatment unit 30 may be an activation signal for activating the nozzles 32a-g of the treatment unit 30 according to a dispensing timing scheme selected based on the received twist level parameter and speed level parameter. Hence, the control unit 40 may be arranged to process the twist level parameter and the speed level parameter and determining the dispensing timing scheme. Alternatively, the control signal sent to the treatment unit 30 may comprise information about the twist level parameter and the speed level parameter. The treatment unit 30 receives the control signal from the control unit 40 and dispenses a coating substance to the thread 20 via two or more of the nozzles 32a-g according to a dispensing timing scheme selected based on the received twist level parameter and speed level parameter.
Although seven nozzles 32a-g are shown in
The plurality of nozzles 32a-g may be arranged in a static nozzle array 70, e.g. further shown in
However, it should be noted that in some embodiments it may be advantageous to allow the thread 20 to rotate more than one revolution between the longitudinal ends of the nozzle array 70, i.e. between the first and last nozzle of the array 70. This could be particularly advantageous when more than two nozzles 32a-g are arranged in the treatment unit 30. By providing an induced rotation to make the thread 20 rotate several revolutions between the first nozzle 32a and the last nozzle 32g an even coating that evenly covers the outer surface of the thread 20 may be achieved by activating suitable nozzles arranged in between the first and the last nozzle. Other colouring effects may of course also be utilized. As the twist of the thread 20 is taken into account when determining the dispensing scheme, it is possible to control the resulting coating (or colouring) effect in a very accurate manner. This is due to the fact that as the thread 20 rotates at some point every circumferential position will be aligned with a nozzle 32a-g. Accordingly, a higher twist rate results in more twist per length unit of the thread 20 thus allowing for a more even and better coverage of the coating substance around the outer surface of the thread 20 as the nozzles to be activated may be chosen, or controlled, in accordance with a larger number of controlling schemes. Further to this, it will also be possible to reduce the entire length of the nozzle array 70 thus allowing for a more compact design of the system 10. How the thread 20 is coated around its circumference will among others depend on the droplet size. A small droplet size will result in a less coating coverage, which means that it may be required to dispense an increased number of droplets on the same longitudinal position of the thread 20 in order to obtain a full coverage around the circumference of the thread 20. In an embodiment, the control unit is configured to set the longitudinal distance d2 between the at least two activated nozzles 32a-g based on the twist per length unit ω [rad/m] of the thread 20, in accordance with 20π/ω≥d2>0. This means that the calculated required longitudinal distance d2 is set to allow the thread to twist up to 10 revolutions between the two associated nozzles. In some embodiments the control unit 40 is further configured to set the longitudinal distance d2 between the nozzles to be activated based on the level of wetting of the thread. In alternative embodiments the control unit 40 is further configured to set the longitudinal distance d2 between the nozzles to be activated based on a pre-set colouring effect. The pre-set colouring effect may be selected from the group comprising homogeneous colouring pattern, one-side-only colouring pattern, random colouring pattern, or helical colouring pattern.
In a further embodiment, the treatment unit 30 comprises nozzles 32a-g, which may be separated by a longitudinal distance d3 that may be increased or decreased. Such embodiment is shown in
Analogously, a lower level of twist as indicated by the twist level parameter is translated to a larger relative distance between the nozzles 32a-g i.e. the longitudinal distance d3 is increased. Hence, by adjusting the longitudinal distance d3 between the at least two nozzles 32a-g it is possible to improve the coating quality of the thread 20, such that the coating substance is dispensed around the outer perimeter of the thread in a controlled manner. It should be noted that for a thread treatment unit 30 comprising more than two nozzles 32a-g, a motor may be connected to each additional nozzle such as to allow for adjustment of the longitudinal distance between each of the nozzles for example, the longitudinal distance between nozzle 32c and nozzle 32d. Due to the level of twist of the thread in conjunction with the adjusted longitudinal distance d3 between the at least two nozzles 32a and 32b, it is possible to fully cover the outer surface area, i.e. outer perimeter of the thread 20. This makes the treatment unit 30 much less complex than nozzles arranged at different radial positions around the thread 20.
In an embodiment each nozzle dispenses a coating substance having a colour according to the CMYK colour model, where the primary colours are Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black. It may thus be possible to dispense a wide variety of colours onto the thread by activating nozzles such that the total colouring substance will be a mix of the colouring substances dispensed by the nozzles. In
Now turning to
Although the present invention has been described above with reference to specific embodiments, it is not intended to be limited to the specific form set forth herein. Rather, the invention is limited only by the accompanying claims.
In the claims, the term “comprises/comprising” does not exclude the presence of other elements or steps. Additionally, although individual features may be included in different claims, these may possibly advantageously be combined, and the inclusion in different claims does not imply that a combination of features is not feasible and/or advantageous. In addition, singular references do not exclude a plurality. The terms “a”, “an”, “first”, “second” etc do not preclude a plurality. Reference signs in the claims are provided merely as a clarifying example and shall not be construed as limiting the scope of the claims in any way.
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|---|---|---|---|
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|---|---|---|---|
| PCT/SE2017/050516 | 5/17/2017 | WO | 00 |
| Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| WO2017/200473 | 11/23/2017 | WO | A |
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