WOOL SCOURING
Raw or ‘greasy’ wool is contaminated with impurities, the type
depending on the breed of sheep, the area in which the sheep are raised,
and husbandry methods.
Objectives of wool scouring are to:
1. Clean the contaminants from the wool by means of an economic
process
2. Ensure that the wool is in a physical and chemical condition to suit the
intended processing route (e.g. for topmaking to minimise
entanglement and retain the staple structure)
3. Comply with environmental requirements (this requirement has
become much more important over the last 20 years).
The term ‘scouring’ is used here in the generic sense of a process that
removes contaminants from raw wool. Thus, it includes all processes which
aim to clean wool including those which use solvents other than water and
those which use solids as a carrier for removing the contaminants.
Scouring clearly is a critically important step in wool processing. It must
be carried out using technology that enables the wool to attain its optimum
performance in further processing.
Sequence of process in scouring
Bale breaker Feeder Opener Feeder Weigh belt Bowl
1,2,3,4...etc. Dryer
Washing wool in scouring trains
A scouring train comprises a number of wash bowls and squeeze
heads, and is usually linked to an in-line dryer and a wool grease recovery
system. Figure1 shows a typical plant layout for a scour for fine (e.g. Merino)
wools; while Fig. 2 shows a typical plant layout for course (e.g. NZ crossbred)
wools.
Older conventional scouring lines typically include four bowls having
rake or harrow mechanisms that dunk and transport the wool. The scoured
product from such designs is satisfactory for most purposes so that the basic
mechanical motions of aqueous scour bowl design have not changed greatly
over the last 100 years. Most of the greasy wool processed throughout the
world is still scoured in aqueous systems using rake and harrow machines.
Scouring Methods
1. Aqueous scouring
2. Solvent scouring
3. Scouring by freezing
Aqueous scouring
It is carried out in a wool washing machine. The machine consists essentially
of a series of long shallow troughs or bowl trough which the wool is pushed
by rakes or paddles. Wool is delivered to the first scouring bowl, and after
passage a round roller, is immersed in the liquor where it is wetted out.
Solvent scouring
There are several major advantages of solvent scouring.
1. Felting and entanglement associated with aqueous scouring are
largely eliminated,
2. Wool grease recovery is much increased, suint recovery may be
designed into the process, and
3. Aqueous effluent problems are avoided.
At first sight then, there are several clear cut advantages to be gained
from solvent scouring, with only minor disadvantages – the necessity for
solvent recovery, possible toxicity and fire hazards to be set against it.
Several different processes reached commercial prototype status
during the 1950s–1970s without achieving significant commercial success.
These included a process developed at the Swedish Institute for Textile
Research, the CSIRO solvent jet process, and a process developed in
Yorkshire at the West Riding Woollen and Worsted Mills Ltd. The Swedish and
CSIRO processes both used relatively high boiling point petroleum fraction,
while the Yorkshire process used tetra chloro ethylene.
A contributing factor is the high capital cost for such plant compared to
conventional aqueous plant, during
a time of low profitability in the wool industry generally.
The wool was solvent degreased, dedusted and then given a
conventional
