Calculating Yarn Requirements for Plain Weave Greige Linen
Exact yarn mass calculation for plain weave greige linen requires converting Lea to Tex, factoring warp crimp, reed width, and 12% standard moisture regain.
Selvedge Ends
Structural Definition
Selvedge ends designate the outermost warp boundaries flanking a woven textile width, functioning as the bound margins that prevent lateral unravelling during mechanical wet processing. Chinese flax mills manage these reinforced zones on rapier looms during the primary conversion of retted linum usitatissimum stalks into grey cloth. Tension differentials between the central warp array and the marginal yarns dictate whether the resulting border lies flat after boiling alkaline scour baths.
Commercial export agreements separate grey fabric grades from raw fibre grades, assigning the former to the finished-goods inspection ledger and the latter to the spinning mill receiving log. European trading houses evaluate margin stability against buyer acceptance thresholds rather than internal mill tolerances when establishing final documentary credit conditions.
Tension Control
Mechanical adjustments on the loom regulate the feed rate of peripheral threads to compensate for high shrinkage rates unique to bast fibres during boiling. Excessive draw along the outer boundary distorts the adjacent pick density, causing puckering that persists through subsequent peroxide bleaching runs. Operators record marginal tension values in the production quality log prior to releasing the loom beam for export packing.
Internal mill standards permit a minor variance in margin elongation, whereas foreign purchasing specifications enforce strict flatness criteria on all delivered bolts.
Finishing Stability
Final inspection certificates document margin flatness after the cloth undergoes cold water rinsing and calendering operations. Thermal shrinkage during the drying cylinder phase tests the integrity of the bound edge, exposing structural weaknesses caused by uneven yarn twisting upstream. Technical auditors verify compliance with international export protocols by measuring residual curl at the extreme fabric boundary.
Final market acceptance depends strictly on the structural uniformity of these border regions rather than the aesthetic quality of the interior field.