You are a carpet installer at a company that has recently decided
to expand its carpet business. It has decided to import rugs and carpets from
Turkey.
If customers purchase these carpets, you will have to install
them. It's important that you know all about these carpets. Your boss gives
you a pamphlet with some information. Read through the following and see if
you can answer the questions at the end:
Rugs and the
various flatweaves are made from five basic materials: sheep wool, goat hair,
cotton, silk floss and silk. The quality of wool varies according to the climate,
the breed of sheep and the time of year of the shearing. Wool from sheep that
live in warm and arid regions is normally dry and brittle. Since it breaks
so easily, it ends up being short and feeling lifeless.
Good quality
wool comes from healthy and well-fed sheep. They are usually found in cold
regions or at high elevations with good grazing lands and lots of water. In
the colder regions, sheep grow a full fleece to keep warm and their bodies
store fat. That translates to a high lanolin content within the fiber, which
reaches lengths of 5 inches and more. The wool feels silky smooth, yet springy.
Wool
is hand-spun by using primitive utensils called kirmen (drop spindles) and
by spinning wheels. In hand-spun wool, the original length of the fiber stays
the same through the spinning process. A fiber that measured two inches before
spinning will still measure the same after spinning.
Wool can also
be industrially spun, but the hard twisting of the fibers by the spinning
machines tends to break some of the fibers. The broken bits and shorter fibers
can stick together through the use of oils during the spinning process, but
the fiber loses some of its strength. That, in turn, will shorten the life
span of the rugs to be woven.
(Excerpted from Tayfun Kalyoncu's web
page with permission)