Automatic Seam Ripping System

Abstract

Abstract Garment industry is a labour-intensive industry producing items of clothing and plays an important role in world’s economy. Most of the garment manufacturers work on assembly line production method by breaking the whole process into multiple activities. Seam Ripping is a manual, labour intensive and time consuming process. Numbers of manual devices have been developed to speed up the process and enhance the efficiency of the operators but, no evidence has been found for automation of seam ripping. The present paper is a part of research carried out towards development of an A utomatic S eam R ipping S ystem (ASRS). The system consists of three subsystems: a) Stitch Identification System (SIS), b) Coordinate Generation System (CGS), and c) Laser-based Ripping System (LRS). In SIS, the captured image of garment is processed to identify unwanted seam using an intelligent algorithm developed on the platform of MATLAB®. The CGS generates the coordinates of unwanted seam in G-code format using LASERGRBL®. The LRS which is a CNC based system burns the unwanted seam using laser. Testing of the developed system is done on a cotton fabric with core-spun polyester thread for 30 samples. The results are compared based on appearance, post-ripping time study and tensile strength. It is found that ASRS samples are visually better as there is no needle hole enlargement or seam distortion. The time taken in ASRS sample is less than 83% of the time taken in manual ripping of an 8” superimposed lockstitch seam. The post ripping tensile strength of fabric is also at par in both processes. The developed system contributes towards an effort to reduce the in-process time and further increase efficiency and productivity which helps the garment industry to be competitive.