Jacquard Weaving - Mechanical Jacquard Looms

Mechanical Jacquard Looms

Originally the Jacquard machines were mechanical, and the fabric design was stored in a series of punched cards which were joined together to form a continuous chain. The Jacquards often were small and only independently controlled a relatively few warp ends. This required a number of repeats across the loom width. Larger capacity machines, or the use of multiple machines, allowed greater control, with fewer repeats, and hence larger designs to be woven across the loom width.

A factory must choose looms and shedding mechanisms to suit its commercial requirements. As a rule the more warp control required the greater the expense. So it is not economical to purchase Jacquard machines if one can make do with a dobby mechanism. As well as the capital expense, the Jacquard machines are more costly to maintain, as they are complex and require higher skilled personnel; an expensive design system is required to prepare the designs for the loom, and possibly a card-cutting machine. Weaving is more costly since Jacquard mechanisms are more liable to produce faults than dobby or cam shedding. Also, the looms will not run as fast and down time will increase as it takes time to change the continuous chain of cards when a design changes. For these reasons it is best to weave larger batch sizes with mechanical Jacquards.