Objective

Main objective: To study and increase total cutting room efficiency

Sub-objectives:

a) “Time & Motion Study” of different operations in spreading & cutting leading to:

1) Determination of efficiency of the worker:

The purpose is to optimize on manpower utilization. Put the best person

to best use and avoid multitude of workforce wherever not required.

2) Identification of bottleneck operations:

Bottlenecks increase the throughput time, which is a significant loss on the critical

time. Bottlenecks should be identified and taken care of immediately to save on

cost and time.

3) Reduction of idle times whenever possible:

Huge expenditure is incurred on machinery. The interest of that investment

should always be kept in mind. As such, machine idle time is a disguised

expenditure in form of loss of interest on investment. Continuously running machine

is an investment justified.

4) Maximum utilization of automatic spreading & cutting systems:

Automation is justified only if it is used to the fullest extent. The intention is to de-

skill and increase production, and wherever possible economize on cost. All the

three purposes should be achieved; otherwise the advantage of automation may

not be one hundred percent.

b) Study of the existing layout with reference to material flow & explore scope of improvement:

Layout affects production flow. It should be conducive to material movement,

and at the same time technically correct. Haphazard layout may obstruct

movement thus costing on time and fatigue, and in turn resulting in loss of time and

energy.

c)To utilize the variable resources manpower efficiently in the cutting section:

It will help in target setting and work monitoring for the activities of cutting room.

Our project, thus attempts to strike at a balance in the production activity- cutting department. And the balance is of the most critical components - Man, Machine and Material…

CUTTING DEPARTMENT

Cutting is the very first process in garment manufacturing. The cutting

department receives the fabric from the fabric department after inspection.

Objectives of the department Cutting according to the master patterns with 100% accuracy.

Ensuring 100% quality in cutting.

100% issue of all the parts to sewing section.

The cutting floor is a combined unit for spreading, cutting, ticketing and bundling. The work of cutting department starts right from the point of order being received from the buyer by the merchandising department. The CAD department prepares the marker using the patterns prepared by the Sampling Department. It also prepares the CAD-Consumption Worksheet and makes estimation for the consumption of the fabric for that particular order. The results are then communicated to merchandiser.

The cutting department at Arvind mills limited; Vadsar unit is an advanced cutting

unit. It uses advanced Gerber technology for spreading and cutting. Manual

spreading is also done here. Cutting department also has straight knife and band

knife. The model no. of these machines has been mentioned later in this section.

Band knife is used to cut small components like moon patch, placket, sleeves

etc. The capacity of the cutting department is 13000-16000 pieces per day. The

department head is Mr. Mittal.

Hierarchy of the cutting department

Head supervisor

Preparatory supervisorCutting supervisor

Operator Operator

Cutting head

MATERIAL FLOW

Issue of fabric from knits store

Cutting

Sorting & stickering

Spreading

Laying of patterns (if manual spreading)

Issue to the sewing department

Bundling

Relaxation

R

CPI (cut panel inspection)

Total number of lights:41

Total number of ventilators:24

Shift wise manpower of cutting department for Gerber:

Process

1st Shift 2nd Shift 3rd Shift

Total

Excess/short

Req. Actual Req. Actual Req. Actual

Spreader 8 7 8 7 8 7 21 -3

Gerber 3 3 3 3 3 3 9 0

Ticketing 3 3 3 3 3 3 9 0

Bundling 5 5 5 5 5 5 15 0

Collar lay 2 3 2 3 2 3 9 3

Cuff lay 2 3 2 3 2 3 9 3

Band knife 2 1 2 1 2 1 3 -3

Cuff overlock 3 2 3 3 3 3 8 -1

Parts mix 2 2 2 2 2 2 6 0

Heat parts mix 2 2 2 2 2 2 6 0

Fusing 5 3 5 4 5 4 11 -4

RBK parts mix 6 5 6 6 11 -1

Manual cut, recut

5 6 5 6 5 4 16 1

Total 48 45 48 48 42 40

The cutting department is divided into two parts one for spreading and cutting of solids and other for stripes. For stripes both spreading and cutting is done manually. For solids automatic spreader and CAM do spreading and cutting. The fabric that has to go for washing is spread manually and cut into panels. For stripes 2 contractors have been employed. First with 13 labors and second with 18 labors.

Working procedure

Issue of fabric

Easing process.

Spreading of lay

Marker laying (in case of manual cutting)

Cutting of cakes

Sorting & stickering

Bundling

Issue to sewing room

For a particular order the amount of fabric, which is required for the order, is

determined by the PPC. In Arvind mills limited no extra fabric is ordered like in

other garment industries generally 5-10% extra is ordered. Since the fabrics

presently were all from Arvind mills textile unit only so no checking is being done.

If fabric is taken from some other unit then 10% random inspection is done .if

three roles simultaneously is found to be defective then the whole lot is rejected.

The fabric is kept in shelves according to lot wise, roll wise and a report of the

fabric received is generated which contains information like lot number ,style

number. The information is kept with the store in charge.

Various Stages in Cutting Room of Arvind:

When a particular order is approved from the buyer planning is made by PPC department to execute the job. PPC sends batch order in knitting room for the fabric according to buyer’s demand. All the information related to fabric like GSM, dia, shade, and quantity etc. is given in “batch order” form.

A batch of knitting room is complete order requirement that consists of everything such as fabric, trims (collar, cuff).

Knitting department completes the order and sends fabric rolls to the stores in cutting room.

Process flow of solids cutting:

Spreading on automatic spreader

CAM cutting

Ticketing

Bundling

Work on Cut parts (optional)

Inspection

Cut parts send to warehouse

The cut parts before inspection are also sent to embroidery, heat transfer printing, fusing and in some cases bottom hem.

Process flow of stripes cutting:

Opening of fabric roll

Cutting of blocks

Making of pattern on block

Cutting

3 straight knifes are used for cutting of laid blocks. Shears are used for cutting of panels. A piece of stripes is on the pattern given for matching by the Sampling department.

Fabric Stores:

Receiving of fabrics:

Fabric comes to stores directly from knitting house. For every particular batch samples comes with audit report from audit department in process house of knits. Audit report contains all information regarding the fabric and trims of that particular batch.

Storing of fabric:

Fabric; is stored according to the buyer’s name. Every buyer is allocated a specific rack in storeroom, so batch for that particular buyer is stored in that rack.

There is no further segregation in the warehouse area.

Issuing of Fabric:

Cut plan department sends the required k&p no. of fabric with other data to the store incharge. Required fabric is then allocated to cutting room from the stores.

Fabric rolls are received in trolley. It is ensured that all fabric rolls are loaded uniformly. One trolley carries a max of 15 rolls.

Easing Of The Fabric (Relaxation)

After the issue of fabric if fabric is single jersey it is taken for relaxation

process.

Here fabric is simply unrolled by the machine.

In this section handling of fabric is done manually bare handed.

Marker planning and marker making:

Marker planning is done in other unit. In this unit, just arrangement of marker is done according to the width of the fabric and gsm of the fabric. New marker is then uploaded in the cam machine.

Lay planning:

Lay planning is done in data-entry department according to the marker plan and the order of the customer.

Spreading

The main objective of spreading is to spread the fabric lay accurately as per the

length of the maker with minimum waste at end of a lay.

Types of fabric laying:

Face to face alternative plies: For symmetrical pattern pieces, and fabric which is stable spread face to face, the fabric can be spread along face up and immediately back again face down.

Face up alternative plies: For asymmetrical as well as symmetrical pattern pieces and fabric which is stable spread all the same way up, the fabric can be spread along and immediately back again.

Face up all plies in the same direction: For asymmetrical as well as symmetrical pattern pieces and fabric which is stable all the same way up, the spreader spreads in one direction only.

Face to face all plies in the same direction: For symmetrical pattern pieces, and fabric, which is stable face to face, the spreader spreads in one direction only.

Types of laying methods

Automatic spreading: Automatic spreader is used to lay honeycomb, pique, and single jersey fabrics of both open width and tubular.

1. Automatic spreading

2. Manual spreading

Automatic Spreading:

Automatic spreading is done for the solid dyed fabric only. After relaxation of fabric; fabric is kept on the spreading tables. From here they are loaded on automatic spreader.

Features of automatic spreader

MODEL: GERBER spreader SY101

Preset: it sets no of plies required 0 point: sets the position of the machine beyond which it cannot move Allows zigzag and face one way laying Has a sensor which stops the machine if it runs out of fabric Dancing bar: checks the tension of the fabric while being laid Distance to be traveled by the spreader i.e. the length of the marker is

fed into the spreading machine system. Maximum speed of the machine 100mtrs/min

Off

stndrd tim

e in % T

OT

AL

7-june

6-june

6-june

4-jun

4-june

3-june

3-june

Date

Gerber off stan

dard time

A B A B A B A Shift

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 Gerber

no.

0.00%

0 Marke

r not ready

Auto cutter off standard tim

e

6.48%

560

225

65 30 Machine

break dow

n

0.00%

0 Marker

width

issues

12.04%

1040

45 105

170

90 No

feeding

0.00%

0 Power

failure

18.52%

1600

225

45 105

65 170

30 90 Total off

time

8640

1440

Total

min

worked

Manual Spreading:

Manual spreading is done for the yarn died fabric and for the fabric that has to be sent for washing. After the fabric is issued from warehouse, it is first blocked, then two persons lay fabric according to the length of marker.

Generally lay is of length of one full piece of t-shirt. A layer of 65-100 pieces is made according to the cut plan. During spreading all the plies are matched stripe to stripe on both the sides by workers.

A separate room is allotted to stripe spreading, cutting and bundling the fabrics which were yarn dyed.

Bundle checklist & Bundle card generation:

Bundle card is generated after the spreading of the lay is done. Bundle card is specifically the information about that certain bundle viz; k&p no., roll no., pieces in that bundle, size etc. this bundle card is made on the basis of the lay data.

Cutting:

Cutting is done by automatic CAM machine for all the fabrics except yarn dyed fabric. For the yarn dyed fabric manual cutting process is used. In manual cutting machine lay is cut by straight knife fabric.

Trims are cut on the band knife machine in a separate area according to the cut plan. Trims are cut in accordance to the main body material of required piece.

Cutting on Automatic Machine :

First the lay is transferred from spreading table to cutting area.

First required cut program is selected form the CAD machine

Particular parameter is set on Gerber cutting machine according to requirement; it consists of speed of blade, area for movement etc.

The lay is cut in cakes of required

Numbering & Bundling:

After the layer is cut the cut pieces are sorted out according to the different rolls. The sleeves, back, front, and placket pieces of one roll are kept together and the

sticker which was used during the laying of the layers is sticked on the cut pieces accordingly and the pieces are bundled.

A job card is attached to every bundle. This job card contains all the information about the bundle and plays an important role till the packing of the garment is done.

Fusing/Heat seal:

Fusing is done for the placket, cuff, collar of the shirts. Different companies/ brands have different requirement for fusing and heat sealing.

Heat sealed machine

Parameters required for the M&STime - 8 to 10 secondsTemperature- 185 0CPressure – 6 bar

Parameters required for Reebok international And Reebok DomesticTime - 8 secondsTemperature - 180 0CPressure - 6 bar

Slit making fusing machine

In slit making fusing machine folders are attached. Canvas and bone both are passed together through the folder.Bone width = 2.4 cmCanvas width = 0.8 cmReady width of the slit = 1 cm

Machine nameHASHIMA HPM – 600B

Parameters for fusing machine (slit making)

Temperature - 140 0CPressure - 2kg/cm2

Maximum pressure that can be used is 5kg/cm2

Pressure gauge starts from

1kg/cm2

2kg/cm2

3kg/cm2

4kg/cm2

5kg/cm2

Fusing machine for placket , collar etc.

Parameters areTime - 5 secondsTemperature - 150 0CPressure 5 kg

Cut parts inspection:

After all the parts are introduced in a bundle with the bundle card the bundle is checked randomly. In cut parts inspection pieces are checked for the sizes fabric fault and cutting fault. Nearly 10% of the bundles are checked.

Tally of the bundle with information on the job card regarding k&p no., shade, size and no. of pieces is done. 10% visual audit is done. Check list is made here.

Observations & SuggestionsFabric inspection department:

Fabric inspection is done for each and every roll from a batch. Inspection is done for the fabric faults and to check the width of each roll of fabric.

But it was observed that every bundle was not being checked for the width.

Mostly due to workers being uneducated about faults many times roll with faults are passed over to audit department.

Sometimes due to lac of knowledge defected fabric is passed and for the same reason less defected fabric is bundled under defected category.

No humidity and temperature measuring instruments are available.

GSM of fabric is taken without drying it.

No instruction is given to rolling operator about the dimension of fabric to be cut for GSM measurement.

GSM of roll is taken from very localized fabric area.

Suggestion:

Each and every fabric roll must be checked for width at least two times; at start of roll and at middle of it.

Correct information regarding roll must be fed in slip.

It must be tried to check the GSM of each roll of fabric.

Employee education is very necessary here.

Samples of defected fabrics or photographs of them should be made available to operator.

Due to excess humidity and temperature,there is more relaxation allowances for worker which decreases overall on standard time.

Due to moisture contamination observed GSM of fabric may vary from actual one.

Due to unspecified dimension of cut part which is utilized for GSM measurement leads to fabric wastage.

Fabric audit department:

In fabric audit department 3-4 rolls are checked for width and gsm of the fabric along with the fabric fault.

Many time GSM of the fabric changes from roll to roll and also in the same roll.

Same thing happens with the width of the fabric.

But as each bundle is not checked these faults pass unnoticed to cutting room

Suggestion:

Cut part which is choosen for GSM measurement should be taken from different location of fabric roll and avg of different measurement should be marked as GSM of fabric.

Width of the fabric should be taken from different phases of fabric roll ie 1st

check when 15 mts are roll is finish.

2nd measurement should be taken at middle of rolling process and third at last.

Fabric Warehouse:

There is no check of fabric prior to storage in the warehouse.

Fabric is not segregated according to width or gsm of fabric.

Relaxation of the fabric:

No proper relaxation machine.

Machine that is used does not have proper attachments.

Fabric handle is done manually. This causes fabric disturbance and relaxed fabric is gets ruffled.

No accountability in this department.

Suggestion:

Spiral rollers should be used instead of plain rollers.

Tray should be used in which fabric is collected and loaded to spreading machine along with the tray.

Spreading:

Automatic Spreading

Running speed of the machine is higher than required

Used speed of machine is very low in the range of 7m/min.

Spreading machine uses more workers than needed.

Spread of single jersey is very difficult due to above operations.

Achievable target is not achieved even after excess operators being implied on spreader.

Optimum lay length is 7-8m but here lay length sometimes is more than 10m.

Lack of attachments in the spreading machine.

Change in width and lack of data regarding the variation of roll width there is frequent machine stoppage; and sometimes even two or three plies have to be removed after being laid.

Manual Spreading:

Excessive manpower allocated in this department.

Hand shears is used instead of end cutters leading to increase of manpower need.

In yarn dyed spread length is generally for a single piece of shirt leading in the need of excessive manpower for laying.

Shifting of the lay to cutting table:

While shifting of lay from spreading table to the cutting table air floatation table is not used properly.

Suggestion:

Decrease running speed of spreader,to avoid turning of plies upside down.

Keep length of spread between 7-8 m.this will help in faster and precise lay.

One operator should always travel along with the machine to fix any blockage in the passage of laying. At the beginning itself.

Spiral rollers should be used instead of plane surface rollers. To insure even lay .

Two diiffrent lays of tubular knits can be spread at a time to utilize maximum width laying capacity of spreader.

Spreading operator have no data about width of roll which causes spreading of rolls with different widths ,this will create loss of fabric as marker is made according to roll of minimum width.

Replace hand shears with end cutters.this will decrease labour requirement from 4 to 2.and will also increase efficiency of lay.

Instead of laying for single piece one can make a block for two piece and after laying block can be cut and operated separately.

Before shifting of lay make sure that air flotation is on and running at highest level.this will decrease tension in lay due to pulling and also distortion in lay.

Problems faced in the cutting department

Bowing

This is a major problem faced in the cutting department while spreading. Variation in the width of the fabric, which form an arc shape during spreading is said to be bowing effect.

LeaningLeaning is occurred during manual spreading. In leaning the top ply of the fabric will be slightly inside the previous ply. It is occurred due to improper laying.

EdgingIt is also a problem faced in the cutting room. On every spread there is a plus/minus variation of the edge of the fabric from the below lay of the fabric.

End lossThe fabric that extends beyond the marker patterns end is called as end loss. This occurred due to improper laying of fabric lays.

End bitsHere in the cutting room we are getting end bits almost for all fabric Takas. After complete laying of one fabric Taka, at the end we get a small piece of fabric that cannot be used for laying which is said to be end bits.

Uneven tensionIt is a spreading defect that arisen only when the layers lay fabric under improper tension and creases are formed on spread surface. Misalignment of pliesIt is a spreading defect that arises when all the plies of the lays are of different length and not lay exactly of same length as per table marker.

Now comes last but not the least:Spirality:Spirality of knitted fabric is obtained when wales is not perpendicular to course,forming an angle of spirality with vertical direction of the fabric.it affects generally single jersey knits and produce serious problem during garment confection and use.Problems occur due to Spirality are:

Mismatched patterns. Sewing difficulty. Displacement of side seams to the back and front of the body Garment distortion.

How to measure spirality???...

For the measurement of spirality angle, plain knitted fabric samples having 10x10 cm dimensions were prepared. Digital photographs were taken by a digital optical microscope using a software (Motic images plus 2.0) permitting to acquire and save images with 10 to 40 times magnifying. These images were taken

from the back side of the plain knitted fabric because stitch edges from this side were easier to distinguish than those from right side (Figure 1).

Right side Back side

Figure 1. Aspect of right and back side of plain knitted fabric.

The images were then treated by Microsoft Visual Basic VB 6.0 software. The image processing consists to improve the image quality (brightness, contrast)

and to draw two lines by clicking on four points belonging to a wale edges and calculate the mean straight line equation .

. Microsoft Visual Basic programme for spirality angle measurement.

The same procedure is applied to a fabric course. The two mean straight lines equations allow the determination of the spirality angle ?. All measurements were performed under standard textile testing conditions of 21°C ± 1°C, and 65% ± 2% relative humidity. No tension was applied to samples under microscope. Seven specimen of each sample were tested and the mean spirality angle and the corresponding CV% were calculated. We produced a series of 16 cotton plain knitted fabric (100% combed cotton yarn) commonly used in the clothing industry by using an industrial single jersey circular knitting machine. (Diameter = 23 inch, gauge = 24, total number of feeders = 74).

The influence of four parameters linked to yarn, fabric structure and machine were studied. The knitted specimen covered a large range of yarn twists, yarn tension, loop’s length and feeders density. When studying one parameter the three other ones were kept constant. Yarn tension was measured by using an electronic tensiometer and loop length was obtained by using a yarn debimeter. Feeder density corresponds to the number of feeders per inch of machine’s diameter. For the variation of this parameter, we performed specific machine setting by using interchangeable miss cams in order to be able to cancel some feeders and to vary progressively the number of working feeders on the single jersey machine.

Results

Average spirality angles obtained in the different knitting conditions are summarised in Table below.

Variation of spirality angle with Yarn twist.

shows plot of averages spirality angle versus stitch length. The degree of fabric spirality increases linearly with stitch length. The relationship between fabric spirality and stitch length is again strong (correlation coefficient R = 0.98).

Variation of spirality angle with stitch length. Relationship between fabric spirality and yarn tension during knitting is shown Fabric spirality decreases linearly with yarn tension with a quite strong (correlation coefficient R = 0.97).

Variation of spirality angle with yarn tension. shows the influence of the number of feeders and fabric spirality. Linear correlation cannot be tested in this case since the number of feeders is not a continuous variable, but spirality increases strongly when increasing the number of working feeders on the machine.

Variation of spirality angle with number of feeders. A very common finishing process, typically used for fine gauge cotton knitted structures was applied to the fabric presented in the first line of Table 1. First, the plain knitted fabric was washed and dyed. After squeezing, the fabric was dried and relaxed by using a tumbler drier. Finally, the fabric was stabilised and ironed by using a tubular compactor. Corresponding average spirality angle are presented in Table . We can easily observe that finishing reduces fabric spirality. The fabric shrank and stitch wales were straightened.

 Fabric aspect before and after finishing.

Spirality angle

Mean (degree)

CV%

Before Finishing

11.5 7.13

After Finishing

3.82 7.18

Various causes of Spirality

Yarn twist:

The strong linear dependence obtained between fabric spirality and yarn twist show that the main source of spirality is yarn twist. When a twisted yarn is knitted into a loop, it will have a tendency to rotate inside the fabric in order to release its torsional strain during relaxation.

Stitch length

Stitch length expresses the tightness of knitting construction. The fabric is as tight as stitch length is low. The observed proportionality between fabric spirality and stitch length can be explained by the fact that compared to tight fabrics, slack fabrics have higher stitch length and then the yarn composing the loop has a higher tendency to rotate inside the fabric after relaxation in knitted fabric construction. In a more tightly knitted fabric, the movement of a knitted loop is restricted, and thus spirality is reduced.

Yarn tension

The influence of yarn tension during knitting on fabric spirality has not been studied in literature. The observed linear dependence between these two parameters is linked to yarn deformation. During knitting, yarn undergoes an important tension. At high tensions, the viscoelastic nature of the yarn causes yarn fibres to slip inside the structure. This slippage straightens fibres and reduce yarn twist and then yarn tendency to rotate inside the fabric after relaxation. This explains why at high yarn tensions, the fabric spirality is reduced.

Number of knitting feeders:

The observed increase of fabric spirality with the number of knitting feeders at a constant machine diameter is due to the nature of weft circular knitting. A fabric course knitted in a given feeder has to be inclined with a certain angle in order to permit the knock over of the row of stitches knitted in the following feeder. This angle depends on the number of feeders per machine diameter. The increase of the feeder density in circular knitting machines is the subject of high competition between machines manufacturers because of its impact on machines productivity. Mayer & Cie holds the record in this matter with the single jersey machine Relanit 4.0 which has 4 feeders per inch

of machine diameter [10]. These technological advances will certainly increase the importance of fabric quality problems linked to spirality.

Effect of the number of feeders on fabric spirality

The observed reduction of fabric spirality after a typical cotton finishing process is due two main obligatory operations: Squeezing and compacting. During wet treatments (ie, washing and dyeing) fabric is relaxed and fabric spirality increases, but during squeezing, stitch wales are straightened thanks to the air injection device equipping the squeezing machine. Fabric compacting contribute also to the reduction of spirality by correcting mechanically wale direction and fixing this correction with a thermal treatment. Finishing reduces fabric spirality but a residual spirality angle always remains. Generally a spirality angle under 4° is tolerated before garment confection. It is then important to reduce fabric spirality from knitting process in order to make spirality correction during finishing possible.

Following are the factors causing delay in cutting department

Spreader stoppage because of nap direction

Defect marks

Splicing

Utilizing end bits

Paper work

Measure length and width of ply

Roll change

Conclusion

The project has been very useful in giving a practical knowledge of the cutting room and particularly knits in the garment industry.

The project has given us a detailed knowledge about the process flow and procedures followed in industry.