Apparatus and method for producing a cut loop overlay of a loop pile base fabric in a single pass of the base fabric through the tufting machine

摘要

A conventional tufting machine is provided with front and back juxtaposed, laterally shiftable, needle bars positioned on a common needle bar support, the needles of the front needle bar cooperating with loop pile loopers and the needles of the back needle bar cooperating with cut-loop loopers. Yarn feed controls respectively feed yarns to the needles according to individual prescribed patterns. The needle bars are respectively shifted laterally according to individual prescribed patterns.PPTufted fabric produced by the machine is illustrated in which the loop tufts produced by the front needles are of relatively small cross section while the selectively cut or loop tufts produced by the back needles are of relatively large cross section. The large loop tufts are interspersed with small loop tufts due in part to lateral shifting of the needles.