Original article

Textile Research Journal

2016, Vol. 86(19) 2032–2042

A comparative study of hair trapping by a ! The Author(s) 2015

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short grooved surface during conventional DOI: 10.1177/0040517515619355
trj.sagepub.com
and siro-spinning

Zhigang Xia1,2, Yanlong Feng1, Qinsheng Guo3, Wenxiang Ye2

and Weilin Xu2

Abstract
In this study, theoretical analysis was conducted for hair trapping by a short grooved surface contacting in different
distances during conventional and siro-spinning, respectively. Then, blended cotton/ramie conventional and siro yarns
were produced without and with the short grooved surface at different position distances. Hairs longer than 3 mm
decreased as the surface position distance increased for both conventional and siro spun yarns, reducing short hairs by
binding them onto the yarn stem. Conventional yarn hairiness H values decreased gradually as the surface position
distance increased; however, siro spun yarn hairiness H values were similar without a gradual decrease as the surface
position distance increased. The hair wrapping caused reduction of thin places, and occasional increase of thick places
and neps for both conventional and siro yarns spun with the surface, respectively. Unevenness CVm results showed no
serious deterioration after applying the surface during conventional and siro-spinning, and even some improved. The
experimental results corresponded well to our theoretical analysis.

Keywords
short grooved surface, hair trapping, hair wrapping, conventional spinning, siro-spinning, yarn property

Ramie fibers are superior to wool and cotton fibers in
terms of bacteriostasis, deodorization, excellent wetting
and fast drying properties. Definitely, they are very sui-
table for summer knitted garments.1 Usually the
smoother and softer the spun yarns are, the more sui-
table they are to be knitted into a fabric. However,
there still exists inadequacy for ramie fibers to produce
desired smooth and soft spun yarns. Ramie fibers have
much higher rigidity than cotton and wool fibers,
becoming more difficult to be controlled by the front
roller nip during ring spinning.2 Ramie yarns have
more harmful hairs and fiber loss than corresponding
cotton and wool yarns. Therefore, ramie fibers are com-
monly blended with softer fibers (such as cotton, rayon
fibers) to produce relatively smoother yarn for natural
functional comfortable garments.
Besides, applying some novel ring spinning methods,
such as compact spinning and jet-ring spinning, into
ramie yarn production may be an alternative to
improve ramie yarn smoothness. Currently, the pneu-
matic compact spinning system has been successfully
applied to condense the ribbon-like fiber strands out-
putting from the front nip to reduce resultant yarn
hairiness, effectively improving the spun yarn surface
smoothness.3,4 However, compact spun yarn fabric
has deteriorated softness5 due to the highly fiber pack-
age of the inner structure.6 The pneumatic compact
spinning system has higher installation and operation
1
College of Textile Science and Engineering, Wuhan Textile University,
China
2
Hubei Key Laboratory for New Textile Materials and Applications,
Wuhan Textile University, China
3
Yuci Branch, Jingwei Textile Machinery Company Limited, China
Corresponding authors:
Zhigang Xia, Wuhan Textile University, Yangguang No.1 Road, Jiangxia
District, Wuhan, Hubei Province, 430200.
Email: zhigang_xia1983@hotmail.com
Weilin Xu, Wuhan Textile University, Yangguang No.1 Road, Jiangxia
District, Wuhan, Hubei Province, 430200.
Email: weilin_xu@hotmail.com
Xia et al.
Figure 1. Theoretical illustration of hair trapping by a short grooved surface for conventional spinning: (a), (b) and (c) hairs in the
conventional yarn formation zone; (d), (e) and (f) the surface added in the conventional yarn formation zone to re-trap hairs; the red
arrow denotes the timeline of the progressive moment t0, t1 and t2. (Color online only.)
costs than the conventional ring system;7 the compact
spinning has no obvious superiority of condensing the
coarse-count fiber strand7 and high-rigidity fibers,8 and
is rarely applied in ramie ring spun yarn production.
Jet-ring spinning re-wraps protruding hairs onto the
yarn stem by consuming extra energy to form an air-
jet vortex.9 Although jet-ring spinning can reduce spun
yarn hairiness effectively,10 it also incurs deterioration
of yarn evenness due to the fiber mass concentration in
a very short length.11 To avoid extra energy consump-
tion for the above spinning, re-trappable contact spin-
ning has been used as a simple and energy-saving
method to improve yarn smoothness.12 The dimensions
of primary used contact surface devices, such as the
plane type12 and the grooved type,13 are too large to
facilitate installation and operation. Thus, the contact
surface device has been developed as a small rubber
style that comprises a metal stick core and a surface
rubber tube sheath.23 However, the rubber surface
has a very short operation lifetime due to its fast
damage after contacting with the spinning strand.
Moreover, it still remains unknown as to how to
avoid disadvantages of long contact surface, the hair-
trapping difference between long and short contact
surfaces and the key parameters influencing the hair-
trapping effect of the contact surface.
To avoid the above disadvantages of the previous
long contact surface and rubber contact surface,
2033
a novel short grooved surface was used to substitute
them. The originality of the study relies on the first
comparative investigation of the novel short grooved
surface’s hair-trapping mechanism and the key
parameter influencing the hair-trapping effect for con-
ventional and siro-spinning. Specifically, the key hair-
trapping mechanisms of the short grooved surface were
theoretically analyzed for conventional and siro-
spinning, respectively. Then, a spinning device with a
short grooved surface was employed to conduct a ver-
ified experiment for ramie/cotton blended conventional
and siro spun yarn production. Thereafter, correspond-
ing spun yarn properties were investigated, especially
for the yarn surface hairiness property.
Theoretical considerations of the
hair trapping by a short grooved
contact surface
Hair trapping by a short grooved surface during
conventional spinning
In the conventional spun yarn formation zone, the
single straight ribbon-like strand outputting from
the front roller nip becomes cylindrical compact
under the twisting force, forming a tiny spinning trian-
gle (Figure 1(a)).14,15 The spinning triangle shape
encourages the majority of the edged fibers to protrude
2034
from the spun yarn stem to form long hairs (hair 1 in
Figure 1(b); hair 4 in Figure 1(e)).16 Even some out-
most edged fibers completely detach from the spinning
strand to cause fiber droppings and flyings (hair 5 in
Figure 1(c); hair 3 in Figure 1(e)).
A surface contacting the spinning strand within the
yarn formation zone performs fiber-trapping by gener-
ating nip points to reduce hairs and fiber loss.16 In fact,
a long contact surface facilitates fiber-trapping on the
surface, while it prohibits many twists inserting the
spinning triangle, deteriorating spun yarn irregularity
and tenacity.12 Accordingly, a short surface can be
adopted to decrease the twist-prohibition (according
to our repeated practice, d  4 mm in Figure 1(b-2));
a grooved surface retains enough hair-holdings
(Figures 1(b-2) and 1(b-3)).
This study employs the short grooved surface-to-
contact spinning strand within the conventional ring
yarn formation zone (Figure 1(d)); according to a pre-
vious study,17 the twist density of the spinning strand
below the short grooved surface (b) increases, while
twist density of the spinning strand contacting the
short grooved surface (c) and the twist density of the
spinning strand before entering the short grooved sur-
face (u) decrease. The combination of the limited short
grooved surface length (d) and the decreased c results
in very limited rollings of spinning strands on the short
grooved surface. However, the grown difference
between b and c secures enough rolling of the spin-
ning strand outputting from the short grooved surface,
resulting in re-wrapping long hairs onto the yarn stem
as their free ends are held by the short grooved surface
(hairs 1 and 2 in Figure 1(e)). In particular, higher twist
density of the yarn thin section18 encourages more
fiber-wrappings in the yarn thin place, decreasing the
thin places (Figure 1(f)). If a certain part of a losing
fiber flies to contact the yarn thick section within the
short grooved surface, they may be foldedly re-wrapped
onto the thick place of yarn to aggravate it (fiber 3 in
Figure 1(f)). Usually some losing fibers are entangled
with the trapped hairs to form neps on the yarn surface
(fiber 5 in Figure 1(f)); some losing fibers are still at
large as they are too far away to be trapped (fiber 6
in Figure 1(f)). Therefore, the short grooved surface
trapping losing fibers depends on fiber losing or flying
trajectories.
Hair trapping by a short grooved surface during siro-
spinning
Unlike conventional spinning, siro-spinning has a large
spinning triangle that includes two tiny diagonal spin-
ning triangles of twin sub-spinning strands (Figures
2(a)–(c)). Each sub-spinning strand has twists,19 which
are finally trapped into the resultant siro spun yarn.20
Textile Research Journal 86(19)
In addition, the large spinning triangle can trap the
edged fibers in the right-hand side of the left-hand
sub-spinning strand and the left-hand side of the
right-hand sub-strand21 (Figure 2(b)). Thus, siro-
spinning has more effective trapping of strand hairs to
produce smoother and stronger yarn than conventional
spinning.22 However, the siro-spinning system still has
awkward control of fibers at the out-most edge of the
large spinning triangle, causing fiber loss and long hair
formation.21
To further improve the siro-spinning hair trapping,
the short grooved surface is also employed to contact
the siro-spinning strand within the yarn formation zone
(Figures 2(d)–(f)). According to previous theory, the
contacted spinning strand will move to the left for a
distance to facilitate twist delivering to the right-hand
diagonal sub-strand,23 reducing fiber loss due to the
increased controlling of edged fibers in the right-
hand side of the right-diagonal triangle (fiber 2 in
Figure 2(e)). Even some losing fibers from the left-
hand side edged fibers of left-hand diagonal sub-strands
can fly to the grooved contact surface, then be trapped
by re-wrapping onto the siro-spinning strand stem
(fiber 1 in Figure 2(f)). Similar to conventional ring
spinning, siro-spinning produces yarns with varied
properties due to the grooved contact surface position
within the yarn formation zone. Therefore, the influ-
ence of the short grooved surface position on conven-
tional and siro-spinning should be discussed.
Theoretical model of the short grooved surface
position on hair trapping
The progressive compact structure incurs a degression
twist density distribution along the spinning strand
within the conventional yarn formation zone,24 and it
reaches the weakest point at the front roller nip (illu-
strated in Figure 3(a)). Thus, the twist density changes
for the spinning strand until it passes out of the yarn
formation zone. Supposing the twist density (x) is
linear to the spinning strand length (lx) within the
yarn formation zone, we get the twist distribution
equation:
x ¼ klx þ C0 ð1Þ
where k represents the change coefficient and C0 repre-
sents the consistent.
If the yarn formation zone length is l0, and the stable
twist of the spinning strand outputting the yarn forma-
tion zone is 0; (l0, 0) and (0, 0) satisfy Equation (1):

0 ¼ kl0 þ C0
ð2Þ
0 ¼ k0 þ C0
Xia et al. 2035

Figure 2. Pictorial illustration of the short grooved surface trapping hairs onto yarn stem for siro-spinning: (a), (b) and (c) hairs in the
siro spun yarn formation zone; (d), (e) and (f) the surface added in the siro spun yarn formation zone to re-trap hairs; the red arrow
denotes timeline of the progressive moment t0, t1 and t2. (Color online only.)

Figure 3. Pictorial illustration of spinning with and without the short grooved surface: (a) conventional ring spinning; (b) conven-
tional spinning with the surface at a shorter distance Ls; (c) conventional spinning with the surface at a medium distance Lm; (d)
conventional spinning with the surface at a longer distance Ll; (e) siro-spinning; (f) siro-spinning with the surface at a shorter distance
Ls; (g) siro-spinning with the surface at a medium distance Lm; (h) siro-spinning with the surface at a longer distance Ll. (Color online
only.)

By solving Equations (2) one can obtain k ¼ 0/l0
and C0 ¼ 0. Then Equation (1) can be transformed as
x ¼ l00 lx . The spinning strand twists will re-adjust dis-
tribution after applying a short grooved surface con-
tacting the spinning strand in different places: a
shorter position (s,cov us ), a medium position (m,um )
cov
cov
and a longer position (l,ul ). A related study
reveals the twist density upper contact guider only
depends on the twist density below the pigtail guider,
the wrapping angle () and the friction coefficient ()
between the spinning strand and the guider.25 For con-
venient analysis, we postulate that the up-flow blockage
ratio () is consistent (i.e.,  and  are set as the same).
According to the twisting transfer theory,26 we can get
2036 Textile Research Journal 86(19)

the following equation (3) for the shorter position cov cov cov cov cov cov
us þ cs 5 um þ cm 5 ul þ cl ð8Þ
distance:
cov cov cov
bs 5 bm 5 bl ð9Þ
8 cov 0 cov
< bs ¼ l0 ðs þ dÞ þ
s
>
cov cov 0 cov Equation (7) reveals that a short grooved surface
> us þ cs ¼ l0 ðs þ dÞ 
s ð3Þ
: cov placed in a longer position can generate a larger twist
bs   ¼ cov cov
us þ cs density change for the contact spinning strand before
and after outputting from the surface, resulting in more
where cov cov cov
bs , cs and us represent the strand twist den-
rollings of the spinning strand to wrap hairs whose ends
sity below, on and above the surface in the shorter are hold by the short grooved surface (Figures 3(b)–
position respectively; s is the distance between the sur- (d)). Therefore, the short grooved surface in the
face and front nip in the shorter position; d is the length longer position can trap more hairs within the conven-
of the surface contacting spinning strand;
cov s is the tional yarn formation zone.
strand twist density change after introducing the sur- The limited twist density can be omitted on short
face in a shorter position. grooved surface (cov cov cov
cs , cm ,cl ) due to the very short
Transforming Equations (3) gives surface length contacting the spinning strand. Then
Equation (8) can be expressed as
8 cov 1 
>
>
¼ 1þ  l00 ðs þ dÞ
< s cov cov cov
us 5 um 5 ul ð10Þ
0
cov 2
bs ¼ 1þ  l0 ðs þ dÞ ð4Þ
>
>
: cov 2 0 Equations (9) and (10) combined to indicate that the
cs þ cov
us ¼ 1þ  l0 ðs þ dÞ
short grooved surface in a longer position directly
Similarly, we can get Equations (5) and (6) for the wraps the hairs onto a more compact yarn surface
medium position (m, cov (Figure 3(d)). This wrapping type can secure the tight-
um ) and the longer position (l,
cov ness of hair wrapping on the yarn surface. If the short
ul ), respectively:
grooved surface wraps hairs tightly onto a loose yarn
8 cov 1  stem (red hair wrappings in Figures 3(b) and (c)), the
>
>
¼ 1þ  l00 ðm þ dÞ
< m wrapped hairs will gradually go loose and looped as the
0
cov 2
bm ¼ 1þ  l0 ðm þ dÞ ð5Þ loose yarn stem comes to become compact, then
>
>
: cov 2 0 the surface hair wrappings fail to remain tight corre-
cm þ cov
um ¼ 1þ  l0 ðm þ dÞ spondingly (blue hair wrappings in Figures 3(b)
and (c)). Therefore, the short grooved surface in the
where cov cov cov
bm , cs and um represent the strand twist den- longer position can trap hairs more tightly onto the
sity below, on and above the surface in the medium
yarn stem for conventional spinning.
position, respectively; m is the distance between the sur-
The limited twist density can be omitted on the short
face and front nip in the medium position;
cov m is the
grooved surface (sir sir sir
cs , cm , cl ) due to the very short
spinning strand twist density change after introducing
surface length contacting the siro-spinning strand. In
the surface in the medium position.
the same way, the following similar equations can
8 cov 1  also be derived:
>
>
¼ 1þ  l00 ðl þ dÞ
< l
0
cov 2
bl ¼ 1þ  l0 ðl þ dÞ ð6Þ
sir sir sir
>
> s 5
m 5
l ð11Þ
: cov 2 0
cl þ cov
ul ¼ 1þ  l0 ðl þ dÞ
sir sir sir
us 5 um 5 ul ð12Þ
where cov cov cov
bl , cs and ul represent the strand twist den-
sity below, on and above the surface in the longer posi- sir sir sir
bs 5 bm 5 bl ð13Þ
tion, respectively; l is the distance between the surface
and front nip in the longer position;
cov is the spinning
l where
sir sir sir
s ,
m and
l represent the spinning strand
strand twist density change after introducing the sur-
twist density change after introducing the surface in the
face in the longer position.
shorter, medium and longer positions, respectively; sir us ,
Before comparing Equations (4)–(6), prerequisites sir and  sir
represent the twist density above the surface
um ul
are set as l ¼ 3s and m ¼ 2s. Then, we can get the fol- in the shorter, medium and longer positions, respec-
lowing equations: tively; sir sir sir
bs , bm and bl represent the twist density
below the surface in the shorter, medium and longer

cov cov cov
s 5
m 5
l ð7Þ positions, respectively.
Xia et al.
Figure 4. The short grooved surface device image: (a) front
view; (b) side view.
Equation (11) indicates that a short grooved surface
placed in a longer position generates more rollings of
the siro-spinning strand to wrap more hairs (illustrated
in Figures 3(f)–(h)). Equations (12) and (13) suggest the
longer positioned short grooved surface can conduct
tighter trapping of hairs by wrapping them onto a
more compact siro spun yarn stem (Figure 3(h)).
However, the yarn stem has become tight already
since twin pre-twisted diagonal sub-strands converged
to twist with each other. Therefore, similar tight hair
wrappings are achieved by the short grooved surface
contacting the siro-spinning strand in different posi-
tions within the yarn formation zone (Figures 3(f)–
(h)), avoiding hair wrappings becoming loose and
looped in the aforementioned in conventional spinning
(Figures 3(b) and 3(c)).
Experiments were conducted to verify these
hypotheses.
Experimental details
Twin ramie/cotton 50/50 blended rovings were used to
produce conventional yarn and siro spun yarn by set-
ting the roving spacings as 0 and 6 mm, respectively
(Figures 4(a) and 4(e)). The count of roving is 678
tex. A short grooved surface device (Figure 4) was
installed on a FA506 ring frame to trap the conven-
tional and siro spun yarn hairs with the same contact-
ing length (2.5 mm) in the standard spinning workshop
of Jingwei Textile Machinery Company. To respond to
the aforementioned theoretical part, the short grooved
surface position parameters s, m and l were practically
set as 5, 10, and 15 mm, respectively (Figures 5(b)–(h)).
All experiments were conducted on the same spindle
with the same spinning settings: opening of the pressure
bar spacer 2.5 mm, draft ratio 48.10 (cotton type three
roller double apron drafting system), desired resultant
yarn twist factor 5.48, spindle speed 11,024 rpm, front
roller speed 142 rpm, ring type PG 1/2 3854 and traveler
type UDR 3/0.
2037
Conventional and siro yarns spun with or without
the short grooved contact device were stored for at least
24 hours under a standard atmospheric condition
(20  2 C and 65  2% relative humidity (RH)). Then,
they were tested in terms of hairiness, unevenness CV
and tensile properties under the standard condition.
According to the CN textile industry standard FZ/T
01086-2000 widely used in CN textile mills, a
YG173A hairiness meter was used to test yarn hairi-
ness, the test speed was 30 m/min, the test segment
length was 10 meters and 10 successive segments were
tested for each yarn. According to the CN GB/T
3292.1-2008 capacitance testing standard, an USTER
4-S evenness tester was used to test yarn unevenness;
the testing speed was 400 m/min, and the testing length
for each sample was 400 meters. The YG068C type
automatic single yarn tensile tester was employed to
test the tensile properties of the yarns; each sample
was tested 20 times with a test speed of 500 mm/min
and a gauge length of 500 mm. All the tests were under
the standard atmospheric condition (20  2 C and
65  2% RH).
Results and analysis
Effect of the short grooved surface on yarn surface
hairiness
Table 1 shows siro spun yarn had more long hairs (hair
length exceeding 3 mm) and fewer short hairs (hair
length within 3 mm) than the conventional spun yarn.
This the suggested siro spun fiber-trapping mechanism
by twisting the pre-twisted sub-strands together could
do well in trapping the soft short cotton fibers, failing
to behave well in trapping the high rigid long ramie
fibers. Long hairs were reduced for both conventional
and siro yarns after applying the short grooved surface
during conventional and siro-spinning, which validated
that the surface could trap long hairs. Interestingly, the
reduced long hair number did not cause an increase of
short hair number; in contrast, the short hair number
decreased, which might be due to binding of short hairs
onto the yarn stem by the long hair wrappings.
Long hairs (hair length exceeding 3 mm) are harmful
to yarn weaving.27 Thus, long hair reduction should be
improved. Then, long hair reduction variation with the
short grooved surface position distance change was stu-
died by examining hairs longer than 4 mm (denoted as
S4) (Figure 6). Obviously, S4 decreased as the short
grooved surface position distance became longer for
both the conventional and siro spun yarns. This vali-
dated the above theoretical analysis about the short
grooved surface in a longer position trapping more
hairs within the conventional and siro spun yarn for-
mation zone.
2038 Textile Research Journal 86(19)

Figure 5. Practical online pictures for different spinnings: (a) conventional ring spinning; (b) conventional spinning with the surface at
5 mm; (c) conventional spinning with the surface at 10 mm; (d) conventional spinning with the surface at 15 mm; (e) conventional siro-
spinning; (f) siro-spinning with the surface at 5 mm; (g) siro-spinning with the surface at 10 mm; (h) siro-spinning with the surface at
15 mm.

Besides hair number, hairiness H value is also widely
used to monitor yarn surface smoothness. Yarn hairi-
ness H value is the ratio of the total hairiness length to
the testing length, with the test principle as follows:
shining a continuous monochromatic light source on
the yarn, the yarn stem is non-transparent and dark-
colored while yarn hairiness scatters the parallel light
detected by the optical sensor.28 Accordingly, the loose
and looped hair wrappings can be detected by the test-
ing hairiness H value. Conventional yarn hairiness H
value results showed that the H value decreased gradu-
ally after applying the short grooved surface contacting
spinning strand in an increased position distance
(Figure 7), resulting from the longer surface position
distance encouraging tighter hair trappings onto the
conventional yarn stem. Hairiness H values of siro
yarns spun with the surface were much lower than the
other yarn samples shown in Figure 7; they were also
similar without the gradual decrease as the surface
position distances increased. This might be mainly
due to the similar tight hair wrappings onto the com-
pact siro-spinning strand for different contact surface
positions.
Effect of the short grooved contact surface on
yarn irregularity
Table 2 shows that thin places decreased after introdu-
cing the short grooved surface, which might be due to
hair wrappings being easily located in the thin section
to smooth the thin places as above theoretically ana-
lyzed. Longer position distance of the short grooved
surface results in more hair wrappings (Figures 3 and 7);
thus, the yarn thin place decrease ratio became higher
as the position distance increased (Table 2). Relative
yarn count results revealed the short grooved surface
could trap losing fibers for both conventional and siro-
spinning. As predicted previously, Table 2 also shows
Xia et al. 2039

Table 1. Comparison of spun yarn hairs produced by different methods

1 mm 2 mm 3 mm 4 mm 5 mm 7 mm 10 mm 12 mm
[standard variation]

(a) Conventional spun yarn 2513.60 650.50 202.40 71.40 34.50 7.00 1.00 0.20
[79.49] [25.37] [14.50] [8.96] [7.25] [3.23] [1.15] [0.42]
(b) Conventional yarn spun with 2469.50 629.50 184.90 71.20 29.70 5.70 0.70 0.30
the surface at 5 mm [116.31] [32.47] [16.39] [13.40] [6.17] [2.45] [0.67] [0.67]
(c) Conventional yarn spun with 2367.90 582.50 162.80 64.40 24.60 5.70 0.70 0.10
the surface at 10 mm [69.40] [23.85] [15.15] [6.77] [4.70] [2.26] [0.67] [0.32]
(d) Conventional yarn spun with 2287.20 574.50 166.90 61.30 23.20 6.30 0.40 0.20
the surface at 15 mm [99.23] [29.95] [20.04] [7.83] [3.79] [1.89] [0.70] [0.42]
(e) Siro spun yarn; 2285.60 656.80 214.80 90.20 43.60 11.60 1.50 0.60
[81.46] [19.73] [16.44] [11.09] [7.35] [4.20] [1.18] [0.70]
(f) Siro yarn spun with the 1971.90 514.00 160.30 66.90 28.10 6.00 1.00 0.40
surface at 5 mm [114.35] [25.59] [16.24] [11.93] [6.49] [2.71] [2.16] [0.70]
(g) Siro yarn spun with the 1931.30 503.20 164.50 63.90 23.20 5.50 0.70 0.20
surface at 10 mm [82.34] [28.22] [16.88] [8.02] [5.20] [2.37] [0.67] [0.42]
(h) Siro yarn spun with the 1974.00 503.20 153.80 59.30 24.20 3.70 0.00 0.30
surface at 15 mm [87.05] [18.68] [11.33] [5.90] [3.98] [1.34] [1.03] [0.95]

thick places and neps even decreased after applying the

Figure 6. S4 comparisons for different yarns: (a) conventional
spun yarn; (b) conventional yarn spun with the surface at 5 mm;
(c) conventional yarn spun with the surface at 10 mm;
(d) conventional yarn spun with the surface at 15 mm; (e) siro spun
yarn; (f) siro yarn spun with the surface at 5 mm; (g) siro yarn spun
with the surface at 10 mm; (h) siro yarn spun with the surface at
15 mm.
that conventional yarn thick places and neps increased
after applying the short grooved surface at 5 and 10 mm
during spinning, resulting from the trapped losing fibers
wrapping on the yarn thick section or entangling on the
yarn surface, respectively. Disappointingly, siro yarn
thick places and neps increased only after applying
the short grooved surface at 10 mm. In contrast, yarn
short grooved surface at 15 mm for both conventional
and siro-spinning, which might be due to the alleviating
of losing fiber accumulation on the short grooved sur-
face apparatus by the flute pipe air suction on the ring
frame.29
The short grooved surface holds long fibers drama-
tically wrapping onto the yarn stem, avoiding awful
fiber-wrapping of the jet ring to cause grave mass con-
centration11 and excessive twist blockage of the long
contact surface to incur unexpected drawing of the
spinning strand.12 Thus, unevenness CVm results
showed no serious deterioration for both conventional
and siro-spinning after applying the surface.
Satisfyingly, yarn unevenness CVm even improved
after applying the surface at 15 mm for conventional
spinning and at 5, 10 and 15 mm for siro-spinning.
Effect of the short grooved contact surface on yarn
tensile properties
Figure 8 shows that the breaking forces of yarn spun
with yarn increased after applying the short grooved
surface-to-contact spinning strand for conventional
and siro-spinning, respectively. The first reason might
be the hair wrappings on the yarn stem increase the
fiber utilization ratio for resisting tensile drawing
force.3 A related study reveals thin places of yarn
are usually the weak places, closely influencing yarn
end-breakage.30 Thus, the second contributing
factor was the corresponding decreased yarn thin
2040 Textile Research Journal 86(19)

places after applying the surface-to-contact spinning
strand for conventional and siro-spinning, respectively
(Table 2).
In addition, hair wrapping onto yarn stem11 or hair
tangling together on yarn surface31 can increase the
yarn breaking elongation ratio. Thus, the breaking
elongation ratio of yarn spun with yarn also increased
after applying the short grooved surface-to-contact
spinning strand for conventional and siro-spinning,
respectively (Table 3). Conventional yarn spun with
the short grooved surface at 15 mm had the highest
tenacity and breaking work among various conven-
tional yarns listed in Table 3, being ascribed to the
tightest hair wrapping onto yarn stem (Figure 7) by
the surface at the longest distance position within the
yarn formation zone.
According to aforementioned result analysis, the
longest distance position (i.e., 15 mm) is the optimum
distance parameter for the short grooved surface
applied in both conventional and siro-spinning.

Figure 7. Hairiness H value comparison for different spun
yarns: (a) conventional spun yarn; (b) conventional yarn spun with
the surface at 5 mm; (c) conventional yarn spun with the surface
at 10 mm; (d) conventional yarn spun with the surface at 15 mm;
(e) siro spun yarn; (f) siro yarn spun with the surface at 5 mm; (g)
siro yarn spun with the surface at 10 mm; (h) siro yarn spun with
the surface at 15 mm.
Figure 8. Breaking force comparison for different spun yarns:
(a) conventional spun yarn; (b) conventional yarn spun with the
surface at 5 mm; (c) conventional yarn spun with the surface at
10 mm; (d) conventional yarn spun with the surface at 15 mm; (e)
siro spun yarn; (f) siro yarn spun with the surface at 5 mm; (g) siro
yarn spun with the surface at 10 mm; (h) siro yarn spun with the
surface at 15 mm.

Table 2. Comparison of irregularity parameters for different spun yarns

Unevenness Thin place Thick places Neps Neps Relative yarn

CVm % –50% /km +50% /km +140% /km +200% /km count %

(a) Conventional spun yarn 24.36 715 2055 8315 3070 –1.5
(b) Conventional yarn spun with 24.49 700 2110 8470 3215 0.2
the surface at 5 mm
(c) Conventional yarn spun with 24.32 650 2265 8460 3305 –0.3
the surface at 10 mm
(d) Conventional yarn spun with 23.39 475 2040 8095 3105 0.1
the surface at 15 mm
(e) Conventional siro spun yarn 24.75 845 2290 8330 3285 –1.1
(f) Siro yarn spun with the 23.82 630 2075 8250 3150 1.8
surface at 5 mm
(g) Siro yarn spun with the 23.93 545 2145 8610 3430 0.5
surface at 10 mm
(h) Siro yarn spun with the 23.86 520 2025 7805 2810 0.3
surface at 15 mm
Xia et al. 2041

Table 3. Other tensile property information of different spun yarns

Tenacity cN/tex Elongation ratio % Breaking time Breaking Work cN.cm

[standard variation] [standard variation] S [standard variation] [standard variation]

(a) Conventional spun yarn 8.82 4.16 2.50 253.07

[1.59] [0.56] [0.34] [78.50]
(b) Conventional yarn spun 9.98 4.45 2.67 304.78
with the surface at 5 mm [0.96] [0.42] [0.25] [56.34]
(c) Conventional yarn spun 10.10 4.48 2.69 305.83
with the surface at 10 mm [1.55] [0.54] [0.32] [82.36]
(d) Conventional yarn spun 10.36 4.64 2.78 321.01
with the surface at 15 mm [0.71] [0.29] [0.18] [40.10]
(e) Siro spun yarn 9.84 4.46 2.68 294.71
[1.33] [0.43] [0.26] [67.50]
(f) Siro yarn spun with the 10.30 4.63 2.79 315.40
surface at 5 mm [0.88] [0.26] [0.15] [37.37]
(g) Siro yarn spun with the 10.40 4.72 2.83 319.02
surface at 10 mm [1.12] [0.38] [0.23] [59.09]
(h) Siro yarn spun with the 10.44 4.62 2.77 320.42
surface at 15 mm [1.38] [0.60] [0.36] [71.70]

as the surface position distance increased. Application

Conclusions
In this study, the key hair-trapping mechanisms of the
short grooved surface were theoretically analyzed.
Analysis results showed long hair wrappings occurred
as the very short grooved surface could hold long hairs
easily. Long hair wrappings reduced short hairs via
binding them onto the yarn stem. Hair wrappings
located in the yarn thin section reduce yarn thin
places; the trapped losing fibers were apt to
deteriorate thick places and neps. A theoretical model
was also built to analyze the effect of the short grooved
surface distance on conventional and siro-spinning.
Results showed the surface located in a longer
position can trap more yarn hairs with tighter
wrappings for the conventional spinning. However,
the surface located in a longer position can trap more
yarn hairs with similar tight wrappings for the siro-
spinning.
For validation of the theoretical analysis, blended
cotton/ramie conventional and siro yarns were pro-
duced without and with the short grooved surface at
different position distances. The results confirmed the
surface reduced yarn hairs longer than 3 mm progres-
sively as the surface position distance increases. For
hairs shorter than 3 mm, thick places of yarn also
decreased, while yarn thick places and neps increased
occasionally after applying the short grooved surface
during conventional and siro-spinning, respectively.
Hairiness H value results validated the tightness of
hair wrappings by the surface improved for conven-
tional spinning, and remained similar for siro-spinning
of the short grooved surface could even slightly
improve other important yarn properties, such as
yarn unevenness and tenacity.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with
respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this
article.
Funding
The authors disclosed receipt of the following financial sup-
port for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article: This work was supported by the National Natural
Science Foundation of China (Project No. 51403161) and
the Department of Science & Technology of Hubei Province
(Project No.2014CFB755).
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