WOOL PROCESSING
Wool is a natural fiber obtained from animal hair, mainly from sheep's hair. Wool processing involves many operations including both dry and wet processes.
1. Shearing:
Sheeps are sheared by skillful shearers who do the job by using hand clippers similar to enlarged barber's shears. Smooth strokes close to the skin of the animals are used for obtaining lengthy fibers so that the fleece remains valuable.
2. Grading:
Grading is done for establishing the quality of the raw fiber in respect of the fiber’s length, diameter, amounts of dirt, and other impurities. Based on the experience and expertise of our procurement team, we assess whether the wool is of good quality, colour, length and ascertain the approximate yield of the material in raw condition.
3. Sorting:
In the beginning, raw/greasy wool is opened by hands by our factory workers who open and sort out the raw fibers manually, separating yellow and grey colors out of the whites so that the coloured fibers are separated at the raw stage.
4. Willowing:
The hand opened wool is then put into a willow machine which further opens the fiber and clears out the dust from the raw wool.
5. Wool Scouring:
Wool scouring is the process which removes impurities and converts greasy wool into a textile product. It is the process of washing the wool in hot water using detergent and mild solution of soda ash in order to remove the non-wool contaminants and then drying it through a chamber.
6. Washing:
The raw fibers are then put into our stainless steel ANDAR New Zealand’s Scouring Plant. It is equipped with automatic rakes and rollers which stir the wool and squeeze out the water. The water impurities and dirt particles are removed by washing the wool with hot water containing industrial detergent and soda ash. The temperature is around 140 °F which is maintained through heating the boiler.
7. Drying:
Once the wool is washed in first four tanks and finally rinsed in fifth tank, it is automatically passed in to the drying chamber through a built-in conveyer. A very high temperature of up to 230 °F in the drying chamber is maintained. The wool which finally comes out is called SCOURED WOOL and yields approximately 98% thus removing almost all impurities.
8. Sorting & Cleaning of Scoured Wool:
After the scouring process, wool fibers are transferred to the sorting section through a blower where the labour sort out and clean the scoured fibers manually. Later, the fibers are passed through Morley Shaker which clears out fine dust from scoured material.
9. Packing & Transportation:
The final output is filled in Jute bags and transferred to the Packing section where the wool is packed in high density pressed bales. We have our own in-house packing facilities where the wool is packed in the form of bales. The packed bales are then marked with specific lot numbers and shipping marks and then loaded into a sealed container ready to be shipped to the destination.
