Textiles: manufacturing – Textile product fabrication or treatment – Fiber entangling and interlocking
Patent
1993-05-11
1994-10-11
Crowder, Clifford D.
Textiles: manufacturing
Textile product fabrication or treatment
Fiber entangling and interlocking
492 35, D04H 146
Patent
active
053534859
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method and to an arrangement of apparatus for producing spunlace material, and also to spunlace material produced thereby. The invention relates in particularly, but not exclusively, to spunlace material which is suitable for use in the casing layers of an absorbent, disposable article, such as a diaper, an incontinence guard, etc.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Spunlace material consists of mechanically bonded non-woven fabric in which interlocking of the fibres and the fibre structure are obtained by entangling the fibres of a fibrous web with the aid of thin jets of air or liquid, i.e. the structure is obtained by means of a so-called entangling process. The present application is concerned solely with spunlace material produced by hydroentangling, i.e. entangling that is achieved with the aid of liquid jets. Such material has pronounced textile-like properties in comparison with other nonwoven fabrics, and also affords a relatively high degree of flexibility to the method of manufacture with regard to the properties of the material produced, owing to the fact that the properties of said material can be varied to a great extent through the appropriate selection of fibres, fibre mixtures, fibre forming, degree of entanglement, the structure of the entangling wires used, etc. As a result, the use of spunlace material has become more and more usual.
Such material can be used effectively to wipe-up or absorb liquid, and also to spread or to disperse liquid that comes into contact therewith. Another area in which spunlace material can be used is found in the casing layers of disposable absorbent articles, where the textile-like structure of the material is felt by the consumer to be more friendly to the skin than other types of nonwoven materials, which are often felt to have a "plastic" texture.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method and an arrangement for producing spunlace material which can be used advantageously as a liquid-spreading layer or as the casing layer of a liquid-absorbent disposable article, and also to a spunlace material produced in accordance with the method and possessing liquid-spreading or liquid-dispersing properties.
The inventive method comprises air-laying a layer of fibres of staple length on a forming wire and air-laying a layer of short fibres on top of the layer of staple fibres, such as to form a fibrous web, and is characterized by transferring the fibrous web to an entangling wire on which there is arranged at least one elongated element whose diameter is considerably larger than the diameter of the wires from which the entangling wire is formed, and entangling the fibrous web on said wire. As the web is entangled, an elongated string consisting solely of staple fibres is formed with each part of spunlace material produced, which during the entangling process has lain over an elongated element located on the entangling wire. Thus, when several such elongated elements are placed on the entangling wire, the material obtained will have a striped configuration, in that the short fibres are collected in the troughs or dales between the elongated elements and because solely staple fibres remain on the tops of said elements. When this process included the use of hydrophobic staple fibres and hydrophilic short fibres, for instance pulp fibres, and when there is used an entangling wire whose mesh size is such that the manufactured spunlace material will be perforated with holes, the material obtained will be permeable to liquid and will spread or disperse liquid in its longitudinal direction. Such a material is particularly suitable for use as a liquid spreading layer of a disposals absorbent article, such as a disposable diaper, sanitary napkin or the like, for increasing the dispersal of liquid in the longitudinal direction of the article, such longitudinal dispersal of liquid being necessary in order to utilize the absorbency of the absorbent pad to the full.
According to one embodiment of th
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Billgren Tomas
Hellstrom Jeanette
Calvert John J.
Crowder Clifford D.
Molnlycke AB
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