Fundamentals of Yarns and Yarn Production

Man’s cultural history goes back about 10,000 to 12,000 years, when some tribes changed from being nomadic forager-hunters, who followed the natural migration of wild herds, to early farmers, domesticating animals and cultivating plants. It is very likely that wool was one of the first fibers to be spun, since archaeologists believe that sheep existed before Homo sapiens evolved. Sheep have been dated back to the early Pleistocene period, around 1 million years ago. The Scotch blackface and the Navajo sheep are present breeds thought to most closely resemble the primitive types. Domesticated sheep and goats date from circa 9000 B.C., grazing the uplands of north Iraq at Zam Chem Shanidar; from circa 7000 B.C., at Jarmo, in the Zagros Mountains of northwest Iran; and in Palestine and south Turkey from the seventh and sixth millennia B.C. Sheep were also kept at Bougras, in Syria, from circa 6000 B.C.

We can speculate that early man would have twisted a few fibers from a lock of wool into short lengths of yarn and then tied them together to make longer lengths. We call these staple-spun yarns, because the fibers used are generally referred to as staple fibers. Probably the yarn production would have been done by two people working together, one cleaning and spinning the wool, the other winding the yarn into a ball. As the various textile skills developed, the impetus for spinning continuous knotless lengths would have led to a stick being used, maybe first for winding up the yarn and then to twist and wind up longer lengths, thereby replacing the making of short lengths tied together and needing only one operative. This method of spinning a yarn using a dangling spindle or whorl was widely practiced for processing both animal and plant fibers.

Flax was probably the most common ancient plant fiber made into yarns, though hemp was also used. Although flax thread is mentioned in the Biblical records of Genesis and Exodus, its antiquity is even more ancient than the Bible. A burial couch found at Gorigion in ancient Phrygia and dated to be late eighth century B.C. contained twenty layers of linen and wool cloth, and fragments of hemp and mohair. Cotton, native to India, was utilized about 5000 years ago. Remnants of cotton fabric and string dating back to 3000 B.C. were found at archaeological sites in Indus in Sind (India). Many of these fibers were spun into yarns much finer than today’s modern machinery can produce. Egyptian mummy cloth was discovered that had 540 threads per inch in the width of the cloth. Fine-spun yarns, plied threads, and plain-weave tabby cloths and dyed garments, some showing darns, were also found in the Neolithic village of Catal Huyuk in southern Turkey

The simple spindle continued as the only method of making yarns until around A.D. 1300, when the first spinning wheel was invented and was developed in Europe into “the great wheel” or “one-thread wheel.” The actual mechanization of spinning took place over the period 1738 to 1825 to meet the major rise in the demand for spun yarn resulting from the then-spectacular increase in weaving production rates with the invention of the flying shuttle (John Kay, 1733). Pairs of rollers were introduced to thin the fiber mass into a ribbon for twisting (Lewis Paul, 1738); spindles were grouped together to be operated by a single power source—the “water frame” (Richard Arkwright, 1769), the “spinning jenny” (James Hargreaves, 1764–1770) and the “mule” (Samuel Crompton) followed by the “self-acting mule” by Roberts (1825). In 1830, a new method of inserting twist, known as cap spinning, was invented in the U.S. by Danforth. In the early 1960s, this was superseded by the ring and traveler, or ring spinning, which, despite other subsequent later inventions, has remained the main commercial method and is now an almost fully automated process.

Today, yarn production is a highly advanced technology that facilitates the engineering of different yarn structures having specific properties for particular applications. End uses include not only garments for everyday use and household textiles and carpets but also sports clothing and fabrics for automotive interiors, aerospace, and medical and healthcare applications. A detailed understanding of how fiber properties and machine variables are employed to obtain yarn structures of appropriate properties is, therefore, an important objective in the study of spinning technology.