Synthetic fiber crimper, method of crimping and crimped fiber produced therefrom

Abstract

The crimper has a pair of feed rollers to supply fiber traveling therebetween. The feed rollers rotate at a first speed. A pair of outlet rollers receive fiber from the feed rollers and rotate at a second speed slower than the first speed. A pair of side walls sandwich the feed rollers and the outlet rollers. A pair of floating scrapers are supported by move with the feed rollers, the outlet rollers and the side walls. Fluid is supplied to and ejected from the scrapers such that a fluid bearing is created at least between the scrapers and the feed rollers. There are two pairs of outlet rollers with a belt rotating about each pair of outlet rollers. For each pair, a first of the outlet rollers is adjacent to the scraper and a second of the outlet rollers is displaced from the scraper. A space between the scrapers defines a crimping chamber. The first outlet rollers are moved toward and away from one another, thereby causing the crimping chamber to open and close. To move the first outlet rollers, a hydraulic positioning unit selectively supplies fluid to opposite ends of the first outlet rollers with the pressure of the fluid supplied to the opposite ends being equalized. Equalized hydraulic biasing force is also used to bias the first outlet rollers toward the scrapers and to bias the feed rollers toward one another and toward the scrapers. Fiber produced by this method and with this device has superior crimp uniformity.