Work Stations & Fabric Racks

I built a rack against the wall out of 2x4’s and closet rods for less then $100bucks. It’s 21’ long 9’ tall and has 3 vertical rows that hold 6-7 60" wide rolls each. Currently it has 19 rolls on it. Then I have a small rack on the side that’s 24" wide and 4’ tall with 4 rows of storage for all my braided sleeves, Dunstone tapes, and shrink tubes of all sizes and a hanger system on the ceiling next to that for all 20 mandrels. I also have a small freezer on the other side for the small amount of prepreg I have.

In our warehouse I have 2 carts, which hold 9 rolls each (4 on one side, 5 on the other, staggered so they do not touch.) Simple steel construction, and with some paint they look really smart.

Any chance you guys can post up some images of them ? Or are they somewhat proprietary ?

Bumping, still want to see pix…

Here is a picture. And also from a table.

I am still looking for the ultimate compact solution to re-roll large rolls onto smaller rolls.

Super nice work flow area Herman !

Its not mine (the left), but I am looking for something similar, but usuable in a cramped space. Preferably to be used on the rack in the 2nd picture.

Thinking about a system as seen on many fabric impregnators.

Hi Room,

Ive been working with the idea of developing a fabric counter that counts yardage as I roll off from a bolt on another core. Just wanted to get some input on how others handle this.

You want to get one of these:

http://www.alibaba.com/product-free/241427942/LENGTH_MEASURING_DIRECT_COUNTER.html

This is a great community, I didn’t expect such a quick response. Ive looked at those type of counters before and am curious if they cause any weave pattern distortion from contact with with the wheel. What about the end roller. Right now I am just rolling these by hand but it would be nice to have a rolling mechanism driven by a crank for large orders.

be aware any pressure on the fabric will cause distortion. best bet would be run the footage counter on the edge of the fiber by the selvage so that the pressure doesnt drag the cloth it atleast has the selvage to support it. this is just from my experiance and i cant say what happens in other applications. good luck

Hi Room,

Just thought I would share my version of a fabric rack. The materials cost less than 100 dollars on Ebay and I can easily adjust or disassemble the rack if needed. Im thinking about making multiple rail based versions which will run along my spreader table.

See pic below:

I Agree Mountainman, my idea was to create a roller system to wind the material through and count rotation by connecting a rotary encoder wired up to an arduino like board.

How to account for the increase of diameter as the roll fils?

Well my idea would use the pressure of the fabric contacting the roller as a method of counting linear yardage without much distortion of the fabric. But the other way would be to use a linear formula for counting fabric as the roll continues to grow. It would be something close to Linear Length / Roll Diameter * Pie * Material Thickness. Note: still working on the linear formula

Material thickness should be changed to:

Material thickness plus factor (dependant on rolling tension).

Simpler would be a feeler which senses the diameter, but then you would be easier off with one of the rolling devices as I showed. I have one, and they are both very lightweight, and roll very easy, I do not expect any fiber distortion as long as they are used on the roll, not on the free hanging fabric.