Technological Research Of Steeping Silk Slices On Small Reels

Steeping is the process of steeping the raw silk into aqueous solution with assistants,making sericin swelling and soft, providing the raw silk good performance such as compliance,flexibility, lubricity and so on, to prepare for future processes and guarantee the quality of theproduct.A new steeping method is put forward in this paper, in which steeping assistant is addedinto the solution during the vacuum permeation treatment of silk slices on small reels. With thismethod, the traditional process of steeping raw silk and drying can be omitted, reducingproduction processes and raise labor productivity. Orthogonal array L16(43) is used to study thenew method. Effect of three experimental factors: balance drying time before steeping, assistantconcentration during steeping and time interval of the depressor permeation treatment and eachfactor at four-levers on the property of raw silk are studied, with breaking strength, breakingelongation, compliance, loop elongation, loop strength and cohesive force as the performanceindex. We use the analysis of variance(ANOVA) investigating the effects of these parameters.The results shows that optimal technological parameters are240min,1.25%and30s for balancedrying time before steeping, assistant concentration during steeping and time interval of thedepressor permeation treatment, respectively for using weft steeping assistant EKI-101; and240min,0.75%and150s for balance drying time before steeping, assistant concentration duringsteeping and time interval of the depressor permeation treatment, respectively for using warpsteeping assistant HC.For further study, the comparison of the properties of the fabric is made, The test indicatesthat: the properties of knitted fabric produced by new steeping method and conventional steepingmethod are quite similar with each other. However, some special properties of the former, suchas abrasion resistance, bursting strength and draping, are better than the latter. The conclusionfurther indicates that the new steeping method is feasible.