Woollen finishing, stock-dyed route

The logic of woollen finishing: wool milling is the core step

Milling is the core stage for the full face, cover and substantial handle targeted by this woollen route. A wool fibre's surface scales all point one way, so under damp heat and mechanical action they hook into their neighbours and drag toward the root — an irreversible felting contraction that thickens the fabric in both directions, buries the weave, and leaves it warmer and more abrasion-resistant. Mainstream worsted qualities skip this step to keep the weave visible; woollen finishing runs the opposite way — milling sets the course for everything that follows in wet finishing. QL's wool milling machine, the WPF-1S, is built for this stage.

Connecting stock dyeing, spinning and weaving to milling

Colour is added at the loose-stock stage. Dyeing is followed by hydro-extraction, drying and opening, then blending and oiling, carding and woollen spinning. The WPF-ZS steams the yarn to set twist before it is woven into yarn-dyed greige. Unlike the woollen piece-dyed route, no piece-dyeing station follows in finishing.

The greige first passes burling and mending, then tubular seaming to help prevent milling streaks. Seaming the fabric into a tube is a different action from joining its ends into a circulating loop for processing. QL supplies pre-owned refurbished equipment for tubular seaming; the next choice is one of the three scouring and milling arrangements below.

Scour–mill set-up, one of three: separate, combined, or mill then open-width wash

Scouring and milling share one decision point, and any of the three set-ups works — the choice comes down to batch mix.

• Separate: mill, then scour (mainstream) — the wool milling machine WPF-1S mills first, and the fabric runs on the rope scouring machine WPF-XN, staying in rope form throughout; the simplest flow, suited to batches steady in colour and weight.
• Combined: scour and mill in one machine — the four-channel WPF-4XS puts scouring and milling on one platform, each channel separated and independently set, so fabric of different colours and weights runs together without queuing for a shared recipe.
• Mill first → open-width spreading → open-width washing — the WPF-1S mills, the fabric is scutched and opened, and washing runs on the discontinuous open-width washing machine WPF-JXPX, the whole piece sewn end to end and washed in open width throughout, avoiding the creases rope processing leaves on crease-prone qualities.

Wool milling: how far heat, moisture and mechanical action should felt the face

How far the fabric felts is not judged by eye — it comes down to temperature, liquor ratio and the number of squeeze cycles, and fabrics differing in wool content, yarn twist or weave density need different run times to reach the same result; exact settings are set by trial on each quality — ask QL for the process sheet. Repeatable milling batch to batch comes from fixing those variables into one recipe rather than stopping by feel. QL's WPF-4XS combined scouring and milling machine offers an optional speed-detection, single-channel auto-stop system, letting each channel target its own shrinkage level and stop automatically; on the wool milling machine WPF-1S, the milling plate adjusts shrinkage in length and the jaws adjust shrinkage in width, on-machine length measurement reads the loop length of the piece, and the machine stops when the milling time is up.

Crabbing and wet brush-setting: setting inside wet finishing

After rope scouring and milling, the fabric is untwisted, opened and mangled before crabbing. The open-width-washing branch opens and washes the milled fabric before joining the main line. QL supplies pre-owned refurbished equipment for untwisting, opening and mangling.

Wet finishing sets the fabric twice: crabbing gives the whole piece a permanent set in a hot-liquor bath, fixing width and length and guarding against distortion or creasing further down the line; wet brushing and setting grooms the nap into one direction while it is damp, then a setting step locks it in place.

• Batch (mainstream): batch crabbing on the WPF-ZN keeps the piece shuttling between a pair of cylinders inside one bath, so every pass sees the same liquor and the whole length comes off with a single, even heat history.
• Continuous: the crabbing section of the continuous crabbing and drying line WPF-LXZH runs the fabric in open width through a series of baths, set bath by bath; it can run as one line with the drying section or stand alone.

Once crabbed, woollen routes commonly move wet fabric on to the wet brushing and setting machine WPF-SSMDX, which combs the nap flatter and more uniform while it is still damp.

See continuous crabbing and drying for independent selection of the two sections.

Teasel raising and face styles

Raising sets the style of the nap. QL covers both media: teasel raising runs right after wet brushing and setting and before mangling and drying; steel-wire raising runs later, in dry finishing, after moistening and conditioning and before shearing. Teasel raising is a wet-nap method: the fabric is still damp and the wool fibre swollen, and the brittle hooks of natural teasel heads give way under resistance instead of tearing through the fibre; repeated hooking curls the nap into a wave, the water-wave finish standard on wave-pattern overcoating and jacquard blankets, with a flat, fine, even nap and a gentle action. The teasel raising machine WPF-CG, developed in-house in 2017, was China's first vertical teasel raising machine, producing a water-wave finish on both faces in a single pass. Steel-wire raising switches to sharp steel pins, usually run dry, with more force and a longer, fluffier nap common on flannel and fleece — pre-owned equipment is available from QL. Both raising stages can occur on the same route: they serve different effects and are not mutually exclusive alternatives. Wet teasel raising is followed by mangling and then drying; QL supplies pre-owned refurbished equipment for the mangling station.

Drying, fabric polishing (whether a lustre face is wanted), pre-shrinking and decatizing

Drying runs two parallel paths: keep using the drying equipment already in the workshop, or add the continuous drying section of the WPF-LXZH — PTFE-coated cylinders, tiered temperature control and alternate-face contact prevent the glazed face and harsh handle cylinder drying can leave on wool, with air-cooling before plaiting. Fabric off a dryer usually sits below normal moisture regain, so the WPF-PP first moistens and conditions it. Wire raising develops the nap and shearing levels its height; these two stages can repeat to suit the required face. The WPF-SM then brushes the fibres into one direction. QL supplies pre-owned refurbished wire raising and shearing equipment.

Where a bright, directional lustre is wanted, a polishing pass follows — the fabric polishing machine WPF-TG combs the pile straight to its root and heat-presses it for lustre; where it is not wanted, fabric goes straight to pre-shrinking. That lustre is only temporary and needs decatizing afterwards to hold.

Pre-shrinking is a choice of two drive types: pin-chain holds width locked throughout — the weft straightener WPF-ZW corrects skew before entry, and the pin-chain steaming-shrinking machine WPF-LTYS then locks width to spec, preventing leg twist after garment washing; net-belt conveying runs tension-free — the belt-type steaming-shrinking machine WPF-WDYS relaxes shrinkage first and straightens weft after, following the relaxed pre-shrinking path.

Decatizing closes out dry finishing, chosen from four methods by throughput and setting depth:

• Batch (mainstream): the discontinuous decatizing machine WPF-JXZN-MAX — a Ø2000 mm cylinder extends fabric travel, and the micro-pressure uniform-steaming chamber acts on the full width in step, for a deep set.
• Continuous: the continuous decatizing machine WPF-LXZN runs fabric non-stop, covering silk and synthetic blends, and can also run as pre- or post-treatment around batch decatizing.
• Continuous-pressure: the continuous pressure decatizing machine WPF-LXZN-P pressurises the vessel to 0–3 bar, reaching kier-grade setting depth at continuous throughput.
• Autoclave (kier): pre-owned equipment is available from QL.

For a fuller, loftier handle, an air-flow softening step can be added before final inspection — mechanical tumbling, not chemical softeners — pre-owned equipment available from QL; regular flat qualities go straight to final inspection and plaiting.

Bring your fabric types, batch sizes and current machine list to QL and we talk process before configuration: WhatsApp +1 380 900 2442, or +86 189 2110 8080.