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The aim of this work was to establish a range of suitable process parameters which can be utilized to produce needlepunched nonwoven fabrics for geotextile applications. Nonwoven fabrics were produced from 100% PP, a blend of 50/50% PP/kenaf and 100% kenaf fibres. The depths of needle penetration of 4, 7 and 10 mm, stroke frequencies of 250, 350 and 450 strokes/min and mass per unit area of 300, 600 and 900 g/m2 were utilized for producing the fabrics, on a Dilo loom. The effect of depth of needle penetration, stroke frequency and mass per unit area on the fabric properties, namely, tensile strength, puncture resistance, pore size, water permeability and transmissivity were analysed. In addition, the effect of chemicals, namely, 10% ammonium hydroxide (NH4OH), 10% sodium chloride (NaCl) and 3% sulphuric acid (H2SO4) solutions on degradation of the fabric was also studied. The results have shown that density, thickness and nominal weight of the needlepunched nonwoven fabrics were related to each other and they were influenced by stroke frequency, depth of needle penetration and feed rate of the needlepunching process. The increase in nominal weight of the fabrics also increases thickness and density of the fabrics. The tensile strength and puncture resistance of the fabrics increased with the increases in stroke frequency, depth of needle penetration and fabric mass per unit area. However, lower tensile strength and puncture resistance were achieved in the fabrics produced at lower stroke frequency, lower depth of needle penetration and lower mass per unit area. Bigger pores were resulted in the fabrics produced at lower stroke frequency, lower depth of needle penetration and lower mass per unit area, however, pore size decreased with increases in stroke frequency, depth of needle penetration and mass per unit area. Water permeability depends on the pore size, properties of the fibres, stroke frequency, depth of needle penetration and mass per unit area. Higher tensile strength and higher puncture resistance were achieved in the needlepunched nonwoven fabrics produced from 100% PP fibres, therefore, they are suitable for some load-bearing geotextile applications, such as reinforcement and separation. However, higher water permeability was achieved in the fabrics produced from 100% kenaf fibres, therefore, they are ideal for geotextile applications where good water permeability is required. Higher values for transmissivity were obtained in the fabrics produced from a blend of 50/50% PP/kenaf fibres, therefore they are suitable for drainage applications. The fabrics produced from a blend of 50/50% PP/kenaf fibres achieved better values of tensile strength, puncture resistance, pore size and water permeability in comparison to that produced from 100% PP and 100% kenaf fibres. However, better tensile strength and puncture resistance were achieved in the fabrics produced from 100% PP fibres and bigger pore size and higher water permeability were achieved in the fabrics produced from 100% kenaf fibres. Therefore, it can be suggested that the nonwoven fabrics produced from a blend of 50/50% PP/kenaf fibres can fulfil almost all requirements of geotextile applications, such as, filtration, separation, reinforcement and drainage. The fabrics produced from 100% PP fibres were not damaged or deteriorated when treated with all the three chemicals due to chemical inertness of polypropylene. However, the fabrics produced from a blend of 50/50% PP/kenaf and 100% kenaf fibres were damaged and deteriorated when treated with H2SO4.

The purpose of this research was to investigate how the quality control manager perceived complaints received by textile companies from their business customers. The population included all textile firms that weave fabric for outerwear (apparel). A packet consisting of cover letter, questionnaire (developed by the researcher), and stamped self-addressed envelope was mailed to each quality control manager in the population. Fifty-four usable questionnaires (28 percent) were returned. The Chi-squared test for independence revealed that at the .05 level, no relationship existed between the number of employee-hours spent handling business customer complaints and the establishment of written guidelines for complaint resolution within the quality control department; nor between the office that handled complaints from business customers and end-use consumers, and the office from which quality control received business customer complaints. The Chi-squared test also found that no relationship existed between the ratings for intended end use for fabric that weavers produced and the type of business customers from whom the quality control manager received complaints; and between the time spent handling different types of business customer complaints received by the quality control managers and the source of these complaints. The quality control and sales offices frequently collaborated on complaints to ensure that their business customers received satisfactory resolutions within the established time. The most frequent complaints received were spots/stains/streaks/dye resistant area, or faulty weaving that most likely came from the consumer product manufacturer, converter, or dyer/finisher and consumed almost 50 percent of the time spent handling complaints. / M.S.

by Ho Shui Leung, Paul, Lau Kun Che, Choi Yin Chau. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 127-128). / ABSTRACT --- p.iii / TABLE OF CONTENTS --- p.iv / LIST OF FIGURES --- p.vii / PREFACE --- p.xii / ACKNOWLEDGMENTS --- p.xiv / CHAPTER / Chapter I. --- HONG KONG'S CLOTHING INDUSTRY --- p.1 / Historical development --- p.1 / Global Position --- p.2 / Domestic Position --- p.3 / Structure --- p.7 / Factory Classification --- p.10 / Number and Size of Establishment . --- p.10 / Labour --- p.12 / Market --- p.14 / Current Constraints --- p.16 / Increasing Costs --- p.16 / Labour Shortage --- p.16 / Increase Competition From Other Low-cost Countries --- p.17 / Pressure From Buyers --- p.18 / Chapter II. --- QUALITY IMPROVEMENT AS A STRATEGY TO KEEP COMPETITIVENESS --- p.20 / Total. Quality Management --- p.20 / Customer Focus --- p.21 / Identifying Your External Customer --- p.21 / Identifying Your Internal Customer --- p.23 / Listening To The Voice Of Customers --- p.24 / Achieve Zero Customer Defections . --- p.25 / Continuous Process Improvement --- p.25 / Improving Existing Production Process --- p.25 / Performance Measurement --- p.27 / Total Commitment --- p.27 / Leadership And Empowerment --- p.28 / Training And Education --- p.29 / Chapter III . --- PERFORMANCE & QUALITY ACHIEVEMENT --- p.30 / Postal Survey --- p.30 / Objective --- p.30 / Methodology --- p.31 / Company Demographics --- p.33 / Company Size --- p.34 / Turnover Rate --- p.34 / Company Sales --- p.34 / Year in Business --- p.34 / Employee Involved in Quality Improvement Activities --- p.35 / Overseas Establishmen --- p.35 / Company Information --- p.37 / Company Performance --- p.40 / Quality Performance --- p.44 / Financial Performance --- p.47 / Quality Improvement Techniques --- p.50 / Productivity Improvement Techniques --- p.73 / Further Analysis and Discussion --- p.85 / Factor Analysis --- p.85 / Kaiser-Meyer- Olkin Measure --- p.89 / Results of Factor Analysis --- p.94 / Chapter IV. --- COMPARISON WITH HONG KONG'S MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY --- p.96 / Quality Performance --- p.97 / Financial Performance --- p.99 / Other Quality And Financial Achievement . --- p.101 / Factor 1 --- p.102 / Factor 2 --- p.102 / Factor 3 --- p.103 / Factor 4 --- p.103 / Factor 5 --- p.104 / Factor 6 --- p.104 / Chapter V. --- FINDINGS IN FACTORY INTERVIEWS --- p.106 / Background of the Factory --- p.107 / Glorious Sun Group --- p.107 / Hinbase Limited --- p.108 / Quality Achievement --- p.108 / Informal Approach --- p.109 / Formal Approach --- p.111 / Quality Certification --- p.112 / Productivity Improvement --- p.114 / Traditional Cost Reduction --- p.114 / Industrial Engineering and Process Analysis --- p.116 / Market Pressure --- p.117 / Management Commitment --- p.118 / Chapter VI. --- CONCLUSION --- p.119 / APPENDIX --- p.120 / BIBLIOGRAPHY --- p.127

Lin Min Ying. / Summary in Chinese. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong. / Bibliography: l. 80-81.

Malfunctions on loom machines are the main causes of faulty fabric production. An on-loom fabric inspection system is a real-time monitoring device that enables immediate defect detection for human intervention. This dissertation presented a solution for the on-loom fabric defect inspection, including the new hardware design—the configurable contact image sensor (CIS) module—for on-loom fabric scanning and the defect detection algorithms. The main contributions of this work include (1) creating a configurable CIS module adaptable to a loom width, which brings CIS unique features, such as sub-millimeter resolution, compact size, short working distance and low cost, to the fabric defect inspection system, (2) designing a two-level hardware architecture that can be efficiently deployed in a weaving factory with hundreds of looms, (3) developing a two-level inspecting scheme, with which the initial defect screening is performed on the Raspberry Pi and the intensive defect verification is processed on the cloud server, (4) introducing the novel pairwise-potential activation layer to a convolutional neural network that leads to high accuracies of defect segmentation on fabrics with fine and imbalanced structures, (5) achieving a real-time defect detection that allows a possible defect to be examined multiple times, and (6) implementing a new color segmentation technique suitable for processing multi-color fabric defects. The novel CIS-based on-loom scanning system offered real-time and high-resolution fabric images, which was able to deliver the information of single thread on a fabric. The algorithm evaluation on the fabric defect datasets showed a non-miss-detection rate on defect-free fabrics. The average precision of defect existed images reached above 90% at the pixel level. The detected defect pixels' integrity—the recall scored around 70%. Possible defect regions overestimated on ground truth images and the morphologies of fine defects similar to regular fabric pattern were the two major reasons that caused the imperfection in defect pixel locating. The experiments showed the defect areas on multi-color fabrics could be precisely located under the proposed color segmentation algorithm.