This document provides an overview of the carpet manufacturing process and associated health hazards. It begins with definitions of carpets and describes the history and types of carpets. The manufacturing process involves preparing yarn, dyeing, tufting, and finishing. Health hazards arise from chemicals used, such as dyes and adhesives, which can impact the respiratory, cardiovascular and nervous systems. The document recommends workplace controls like engineering and administrative controls, hygiene practices, and personal protective equipment to mitigate health risks.

1. By
Aya Mohammed Fathi
Occupational Medicine
Department, Zagazig University,
Egypt

2. 1- Definition of carpet.
2- Overview of the Industry.
3- The Manufacturing Process.
4- Health Hazards.
5- Workplace Controls.

4. *A carpet is a textile floor covering typically
consisting of an upper layer of pile
attached to a backing.

5. *The term "carpet" is often used interchangeably
with the term "rug", although the term "carpet"
can be applied to a floor covering that covers an
entire house, whereas a "rug" is generally no
bigger than a single room, and traditionally does
not even span from one wall to another, and is
typically not even attached as part of the floor.

7. *The knotted pile carpet probably originated in
the 3rd or 2nd millennium BC in West Asia,
although there is evidence of goats and sheep
being sheared for wool and hair which was
spun and woven as far back at the 7th
millennium.

8. *The earliest surviving pile carpet is the "Pazyryk
carpet", which dates from the 5th-4th century BC.
It was excavated by Sergei Ivanovich Rudenko in
1949 from a Pazyryk burial mound in the Altai
Mountains in Siberia. This richly colored carpet is
200 x 183 cm.

9. *Egyptian Rugs and
Carpets
*Egypt has a rug-weaving tradition that dates
back to at least the sixteenth century. After a
brief period of glory, though, it seems to have
gone into abeyance until after World War Two.

10. *The birth of the handmade carpet industry in
modern Egypt dates to the Egyptian Revolution in
1952, when the importation of carpets from Iran
ceased.

12. I. Elements of carpet

14. *I. Piles
*Face Or Pile: The visible surface of carpet consisting
of yarn tufts in loop and/or cut configuration.
Sometimes called ‘face’ or ‘nap’.
*The pile was traditionally made from wool, but, since
the 20th century, ninety-seven percent of pile yarns
are made up of synthetic fibers that are less
expensive than wool.

15. *Synthetics are plastics such as nylon (which is in
66% of all carpet), acrylics (15%), polyester (less
than 15%), and polypropylene (less than 5%).
These pile yarns are dyed using a variety of organic
chemical compounds, or occasionally, organometallic
complexes.

16. *II Backing
*They are Fabrics & yarns that make up the
carpet as opposed to the carpet pile or face.

17. *a. Primary Backing: Woven or non woven
polypropylene in which the yarn is inserted by the
tufting needles. The face fibers are attached to the
primary backing, which holds them in place.
*Primary backing can be made also of natural
material, e.g., jute. It has bonding material made out
of rubber, or plastic or other adhesives that hold the
fiber in place.

18. *b. Secondary Backing: Fabric laminated to the
back of the carpet to reinforce it and increase
dimensional stability. This lengthens the carpet’s
life, prolongs the softness, reduces wear &
tear, provides extra insulation against
extremes of cold & heat & adds an extra sound
absorbing layer.

19. *The adhesive used to bind the primary and
secondary backings together is almost
universally synthetic rubber latex.

20. *III Underlay
*It is carpet cushion under rugs
*The most common padding is rebond
(bonded urethane), though various
forms of synthetic latex, polyurethane,
or vinyl might be used instead. Although
rare, some carpet cushioning is made
up of horse hair or jute.

21. *Types of piles
1. Cut pile
*Cut pile carpets are manufactured by cutting the
yarn loops which produces an upright pile that
has a more luxurious, formal look than loop pile.

22. *Types of cut piles:
Velvet or Plush: It is a smooth, soft & generally it
is used in living rooms. Velvet yarn has very little
twist and each tuft is cut at the same height.
Frieze: Tightly twisted with short, curly fibers that
hide footprints.

24.  Saxony: It has appearance between plush and
frieze.
Twist pile . Is made by twisting two yarns
Shag: It uses a longer tuft and thicker yarn.

25. Shag
Saxony

26. 2. Loop piles
oIn loop Pile each yarn remains in a loop,
rather than being cut to create a tuft.
oThey are long lasting and easy to clean

27. Types of loop piles:
 Berber: Berber have thick yarns and are often
distinguished by their ‘flecked’ appearance, which is
excellent for hiding traffic marks.
Sisal: Twisted synthetic yarns that imitate the
hardy, woven grass feel of aboriginal crafts. They
are tighter than Berbers, with a stiff feel.

28. *Multi-level Loop Pile Carpets :Two or three
different loop heights are used throughout the
carpet to create random patterns of geometric
images.

31. *Shag carpets

33. *Woven carpets
*The highest quality carpets are made by the weaving
method
*It is produced on loom which is very similar to woven
cloth

34. *They are made from different colored yarns & are
capable of producing very intricate patterns.
*These carpets are usually the most expensive due
to the relatively slow speed of the manufacturing
process.
*There are three types of carpets wilton, axminster
and oriental.

36. Wilton carpetAxminster carpet

37. *Oriental carpet
*They are hand woven
*Their origin is from middle -east,& Indian subcontinents
*Based on country origin they are called Indian ,Afghan,
Persian & so on.
*They are durable but costly.

39. II Description of Process
1. Preparing the yarn
*Synthetic yarns arrive at the carpet
manufacturer either in staple fiber form or
bulk continuous filament form.

40. *Staple — Short lengths of loose, individual
strands that arrive in bales, which average 7
inches (18 cm) long.
*Bulked continuous filament (BCF) —
Continuous strands of synthetic fiber formed into
yarn bundles of a given number of filaments

41. *Several bales are blended together into one
batch in a hopper. Then, after lubrication, they
are spun into long, loose ropes called slivers by a
carding machine.
*A sliver is a long bundle of fiber that is generally
used to spin yarn.

42. Carding machine

43. *The slivers are then pulled, straightened, and
spun into single yarn that is wound onto spools.

44. *Both the single-ply fibers must now be twisted
together to form thicker two ply yarn suitable for
tufting.

45. *The yarns are then steamed to bulk them, and then
heated to 270-280°F (132-138°C). This heat setting
causes the yarn to maintain its shape by fixing its
twist. After cooling, these yarns are wound onto
tubes and transported to the tufting machines.

46. 2. Dyeing the yarn
*Most carpets are dyed after tufting, yet sometimes
the yarns are dyed first.

47. *The methods include:
1. putting 500-1,000 pounds (227-455 kg) of fiber
into pressurized vats through which treated dyes
are circulated, passing the fiber continuously
through the bath, or passing skeins of yarn
through the vat of dye.

48. *2. The yarn can also be put on forms, and the
heated dyes can then be forced under pressure
from inside the forms to color the yarn.
*3. Another method passes the yarn through printing
rollers.
* All yarn that has been dyed is then steamed,
washed and dried.

49. 3. Tufting the carpet
*Tufting means the insertion of tufts of yarn
through a carpet-backing fabric, creating a pile
surface of cut and/or loop ends.

50. Method:
*The yarn is put on a creel (a bar with skewers)
behind the tufting machine, then fed into a nylon tube
that leads to the tufting needle. The needle pierces
the primary backing and pushes the yarn down into a
loop.

52. *A looper, or flat hook, seizes and releases the loop
of yarn while the needle pulls back up; the backing
is shifted forward and the needle once more pierces
the backing further on.

53. *This process is carried out by several hundred
needles (up to 1,200 across the 12 foot width),
and several hundred rows of stitches are
carried out per minute.

54. 4. Dyeing the tufted carpet
*For solid color carpeting, carpet of several standard
roll lengths is sewn together to make a continuous
roll, which is then fed into a vat. The vat is filled with
water, which is first heated before dyes and
chemicals are mixed in. The mixture is then slowly
brought to a boil and cooked for four hours.

55. *To make printed carpet of various designs, white
carpet passes under screens in which holes in the
desired pattern have been cut. The desired color is
squeegeed through the holes in the screen. Up to
eight colors can be applied with this method.

56. *After dyeing, the carpet is then steamed to fix the
color, excess color is washed off, and the carpet
is dried and put on a roll.

57.  Types of dyes:
*Plant or natural dyes
*Mineral dyes as manganese and lead.
*Aniline dyes.
*Chromium dyes.

58. 5. Finishing the carpet
*The dyed carpet are rolled under a dispenser
that spreads a coating of latex onto the bottom of
the carpet. At the same time, a strong secondary
backing is also coated with latex. Both of these
are then rolled onto a marriage roller, which
forms them into a sandwich and seals them
together.

59. *The carpet is then placed in an oven to cure the
latex.
*The completed carpet is then steamed, brushed,
vacuumed, and run through a machine that clips off
any tufts that rise above its uniform surface.

61. Accidents
Fires
physical hazards:
*A. Heat
*B. Noise

62. Chemical hazards:
 Effect on respiratory system:
*Respiratory irritation
*Chronic bronchitis
*Occupational asthma
*Nasal septal perforation, nasal, paranasal and
bronchogenic carcinoma.

63.  Effect on cardiovascular system:
*Lead; hypertension and anemia.
*Aniline; methemoglobinaemia.
 Effect on skin:
*contact dermatitis
*PVC; acreosteolysis

64.  Effect on renal system:
*Lead; acute tubular necrosis, Toni Fanconi
syndrome.
*Chromium; acute tubular necrosis, mild GN.
*Aniline; cancer bladder.

65.  Effect on CNS:
*Lead; sensorimotor peripheral neuropathy,
encephalopathy and psychiatric changes.
*Solvents; In high concentrations, narcosis is
produced . CNS depression in chronic exposure.

66.  Effect on liver:
*Lead and solvents; toxic hepatitis
*PVC; angiosarcoma
 Effect on eye:
*Eye irritation
*Conjunctivitis

67.  Effect on musculoskeletal system:
*Lead; arthralgia, myalgia and gouty arthritis.
 Effect on reproductive system:
*Lead; menstrual disorders, abortion, premature labor
in females.
Changes in sperm motility and morphology in males.

68. Ergonomic hazards:
*Back pain
*Finger pain
*Wrist pain

70. A. Engineering measures
*Isolation (e.g., isolated storage, separate process
areas, enclosures, closed systems)
*local exhaust ventilation
*Mechanization of process

71. B. Hygienic measures
*Good personal hygiene program
*Housekeeping
*Periodic inspection and maintenance of
production, process and control equipment
*Environmental monitoring

72. *Proper use, maintenance, and cleaning of personal
protective equipment
*Gloves, protective clothing, and eye protection may
frequently be required.

73. C. Administrative measures
*Decrease number of workers
*Decrease number of working hours
*Employee exposures also can be controlled by
scheduling operations with the highest exposures
at a time when the fewest employees are present
*Hazard communication program.

74. D. Personal measures
*Good employee training and education
*Good supervision

75. E. Medical measures
*Pre placement examinations to exclude
susceptible workers
*Periodic examination
*Biological monitoring
*Record keeping