Carpet How It's Made

Knowing how carpet is made can be very advantageous. Knowing the different materials that make up various carpets also helps you understand and evaluate their performance aspects: why certain carpets are easier to install, why some wear better, longer, and why others are easier to care for and clean. It can also make you a smarter shopper.

Selections:

Thicker is not always better
A tight twist in each yarn is better than loose and frayed
Firm and dense pile means quality
The more backing seen, the less dense and durable
High traffic areas need lower profiles to avoid matting and crushing

Step 1: Fiber

Basic material of makeup
90% is synthetic fiber
Rest is natural fiber, mostly wool

Synthetic Fibers

Made up of 1 of 3 materials: nylon, polypropylene or polyester
Created by chemical processes from oil and natural gas

Nylon

75% is made of nylon
Performs the best overall
Leader in: appearance retention, fade and heat resistance, soil and stain resistance, color and styling
Highest performance nylon is Type 6.6 for more resistant to stain penetration

Polypropylene

Next most common material is polypropylene
Introduced in the late 1950's in Italy
BCF represents more than 35% of all fibers
Not as resilient or resistant to abrasion as nylon
Natural stain and fade resistant
Naturally resistant to moisture
More limited range of color options
Most often used in loop pile constructions

Polyester

Third type of material is polyester
Introduced to the carpet industry in the mid-1960 's
Well accepted for bulkiness, color clarity, and good stain and fade resistance
Not as resilient as nylon
Can be a good performer

PET

Mohawk makes from plastic bottles
Plastic is collected, separated by color, and then ground and melted
Used to manufacture the PET carpet fiber
Carpets of PET staple fiber are made from 100% recycled material
Great color clarity, stain resistance, durability
Keeps over 3 billion bottles out of landfills

SmartStrand

Made with DuPont Sonora polymer
DuPont and Mohawk make this fiber into carpet
SmartStrand with DuPont Sorona is continuous filament fiber
Eliminates shedding
Highly stain resistant and durable
40% of the fiber made from corn by-products

Wool

The above three materials make up the majority of synthetic fibers.
The other type of fiber used in carpet construction is staple fiber.
While some synthetics are used in the creation of staple fibers, the original staple fiber used in the making of carpet is wool.
The wool used in today's carpet comes primarily from New Zealand, Argentina, and the United Kingdom.
Since wool is a natural fiber, it ranges in color from off-white to black, with many earthen tones between.
Wool doesn't stand up to abrasion and moisture as well as synthetics, it cleans well and is known to age gracefully.
Wool is the most expensive carpet fiber and represents less than one percent of the U.S. carpet market.

Berber

Considered a type of carpet construction
Actually comes from the name of a group of North African sheepherders called the Berbers
Berbers produced coarse wool with color flecks in their yarns

Carpet is made in a 3-part process.

#1 Tufting

Begins with weaving the synthetic or staple fiber into a primary backing material
Usually made of woven polypropylene
Main value is to provide a base cloth to hold the yarn while tufting happens
Tufting machine has 800 to 2000 needles like a sewing machine to pull the yarn through the primary backing material
Tufting machine is 12 feet wide, its needles penetrate the backing and a small hook (looper) grabs the yarn to holds it in place

Loop pile construction

Holds appearance well
No exposed yarn tips
Only sides of the yarn are exposed to wear and stress
Known to hold up the best

Alternative step

Sometimes the looper cuts small loops creating a cut pile
Length of these pieces called pile height, or distance between the looper and primary backing
Cuts are controlled by a computer and can be programmed to cut only some of the loops
This cutting is called cut and loop construction and creates pattern on the surface

#2 Application of dye

Two dyeing processes

Yarn dyeing / pre-dyeing - color is applied to the yarn prior to tufting
Advantages are good side-by-side color consistency, large lot sizes, and uniformity
Carpet dyeing - applying color to the yarn after tufting
Benefits - greater color flexibility

Carpet dyeing methods

Beck/batch dyeing - stitching the ends together, then running the tufted carpet loop through large vats of dye and water for several hours.
Beck process ideal for small runs, heavier face weight products
Continuous dyeing (similar to Beck dyeing) - carpet is also run through processes other than dyeing
Continuous dyeing - applies color to the face by spraying or printing, also to create multicolor or patterned effects
Screen printing - color is applied through anywhere from 1-8 silk-screens.

#3 Manufacturing the carpet

Finishing process- single production line that completes the final construction stages

Coating of latex applied to dyed carpet's primary and secondary backing
Secondary backing - made of woven synthetic polypropylene
Two parts are squeezed together in a largely heated press and held firmly to preserve the shape

Shearing- removing loose ends and projecting fibers created during the tufting process
Also helps the yarn's tip definition
Inspection - for color uniformity and defects before it is rolled, wrapped and shipped

Terms and construction variables

Pile height, or nap

Length of the tuft measured from the primary backing to the yarn tips
Shown as a fraction, or decimal equivalent
Shorter pile is more durable than longer pile
Stitch rate - measure of how close the yarns are together
Stitch rate is measured in penetrations, or tufts, in a given length of carpet, usually an inch.
Stitch rate is controlled by the speed the carpet is moved through the tufting machine
Good number is seven to eight tufts per inch
Face weight-actual amount of fiber per square yard, measured in ounces
Typical carpet may have a face weight of 35 to 45 oz
Density- how tightly the yarn is stitched into the primary backing
Higher density will wear better than low density