Minutes of the Testing Consortium held at the Hosiery Technology Center
Hickory, NC on October 3, 2000
The first item discussed was the reaction to the Standards and Testing Methodology Rollout held September 18-19th, 2000. All agreed that the rollout was well received and went off extremely good. There were still some issues that we need to address in going forward. These are:
- There is still some confusion between methodologies vs. actual standards.
- Manufacturers are reluctant to switching to using new devices. Some said that they will change when one of their customers tell them to.
- Some people did not realize the bottom line benefits of common methodologies used by all involved in hosiery.
The group agreed that more education is needed. A summary spelling out the benefits and implications of these methods needs to be created. This summary will then be emailed, posted on the web and sent out to manufacturers and retailers. Dan St. Louis, Art Caldwell and Tony Whitener will create this document.
We then discussed the items that we need to accomplish as we go forward. These are the following:
FIT Committee
- More Retail and Manufacturer Buy In
- Finalizing test spring calibration procedure.
- Recheck Cetme, Cimation, New DSC
- Approval of new or modified machines.
- Test machine correlation between different machine types.
- Determine the percentage variation in knitted sock fabrics.
- Effect of fabric density on test equipment setup.
- Actual standards for hosiery products
- AATCC and ASTM Certification of test procedures
Abrasion Committee
- Run another DOE
- Consult with 3M
- Design of new machinery or modifications to existing machines
- Certification by ASTM
How we fund the ongoing testing necessary to accomplish the items above was the next item discussed. An initial grant from NCMEP covered the first one and one half years of the testingand analysis for NCSU and HTC. The last 6 months has had over 500 hours of work from NCSU and 2600 hours from the HTC in running tests that the costs were not covered. This is over $100,000 in labor costs that were incurred by the two schools. The projected cost to continue at the current fast pace of the last 6 months isapproximately $125,000/year. We need to find a source of funding for the project as we go forward. Possible sources of funding were discussed and will be investigated. Cliff Seastrunk and Dan St. Louis will report on these findings at the next meeting.
Test spring calibration and correlation between machines was the topic of the next discussion. Gregg Ellis led a discussion about springs vs. socks and how it was important to get a spring with approximately the same force it takes to stretch an “average” sock. The pull of the spring along with the length the spring stretches must be specified. The results of the discussion was a method to determine the proper type of spring based on testing 3 different types of socks with different needle counts. Six socks each of 84, 132 and 200 needle counts will be provided by Great American Knitting. Simon Yakopson will test them on an Instron machine at Beiersdorf - Jobst with the standard ASTM settings for knit fabrics. The results will be sent to Gregg Ellis at CIMation Technologies who will pick the spring size that matches the average stress/strain curves of the socks. CIMation will then make a test spring jig that can be used on all of the approved fit machines. This test spring jig will allow for easy mounting without any pinch points on the spring. Machine to machine correlation studies can then begin with this test spring jig in place.
The next full committee meeting is tentatively scheduled for November 14, 2000 at The Hosiery Technology Center in Hickory at 10:30 am.
Agenda Items for the November meeting:
- Summary Sheet
- Funding issues
- Test Spring Jig
- Machine to machine correlation
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