by Jimmy Patrick

Created on: June 12, 2008   Last Updated: June 18, 2008

If you set out to make yourself some carpet, you would have two options: weaving or tufting. For centuries carpets have been woven by hand or by machine, yet 90 percent of carpet in our modern world is made by tufting.

Woven carpet is still available and actually provides the most luxurious and most enduring form of carpet out there. Those two aspects usually add up to more dollars needed for production and for purchase, which are the primary reasons tufted carpet is now so much more prevalent. It is cheaper to make, faster to make and more accessible for the average home owner.

Of course, tufting involves computers, as anyone living in the 21st century might suspect. Using the computer, a carpet manufacturer can choose color patterns, styles, and density of the carpet, then set a machine to do all the work for them.

The tufting machine is basically a giant sewing machine. Usually about 12 feet wide, it contains anywhere from 800 to 2000 needles all working together. The needles push the yarn into a pre-woven backing, usually made of woven polypropylene, and the yarn gets held in place by what they call "loopers."

The backing of the carpet is actually a good indicator of the quality of your carpet. A good rule of thumb to follow is to measure the thickness of the backing. The thicker the backing, the less durable your carpet probably is.

The most common material used to make yarn is nylon. Comprising around 70% of all carpet production today, nylon beats out polypropylene and polyester as the primary carpet fiber. Nylon is the most durable and stain resistant fiber, so it stands to reason it would be the most in demand.

Color choice is applied to the carpet in two ways. If the color gets applied before tufting begins, we call it yarn-dyeing. If it is applied after the tufting, it is called carpet-dyeing. Yarn-dyeing is best for dyeing lots of material at once and for obtaining a good color consistency. Carpet-dyeing has a few different methods that are more useful for smaller productions.

There is the Beck method or carpet-dyeing in which the ends of the carpet are stitched together forming a large loop of carpet that will roll over and over through vats of carpet dye for several hours.

For patterned prints or multicolored carpets, continuous dyeing or screen printing are the best method. Continuous dyeing applies color by spraying the colors directly on to the tufted carpet. Screen printing applies the color through use of silk screens. All the carpet-dyeing methods provide a greater variety of color options and less expensive application than yarn-dyeing.

Carpet dyeing is a full business in itself. There are actually certified carpet technologists in this world that can instantly change or restore your carpet dye.

Before carpet can be redyed in your home, the manufacturing process has a few loose ends to tie up. A shearing process takes place in which the newly constructed carpet has all the loose fibers removed. A layer of latex is also applied to both sides of the carpet and it then is is squeezed in a large, heated press to help it hold its form. Finally, it is rolled up and shipped out to the retailers warehouse.

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