How is a carpet created?

Important Points to Remember

Have you ever wondered about the process behind making carpets? While it might not be the most exciting conversation topic at a party, it’s actually quite fascinating. Here’s an interesting tidbit: Your current carpet might have been immersed in a large vat of water during production. That’s one of the methods used to dye carpets.

Don’t feel bad if you're unsure about how carpet is made, even if you're sitting or standing on it right now. Carpet, though often overlooked, has been a part of our homes for thousands of years. Middle Eastern tribes started using it in their huts 2,500 years ago, and today, more than a billion square feet of carpet are produced annually in the United States, with about 70 percent of it coming from Dalton, Georgia. While it might seem unremarkable, take a closer look and you’ll find there’s more to carpet than meets the eye.

A simple touch can reveal a lot about carpet. You can tell whether the pile — the visible top part of the carpet — consists of individual strands (cut pile) or loops (tufted). You’ll also be able to assess the density, or face weight, of the pile. Additionally, you might discover that a carpet you thought was one solid color is actually an optical illusion created by several different dyes combining to form what looks like a single shade.

How is carpet made? What’s involved in its creation? Let's explore the process on the next page.

The Carpet-Making Process

The soft, plush carpet in your living room begins as loose strands of fiber known as staples. These staples are placed into a hopper, where they are heated, lubricated, and transformed into slivers, which are then wound into a long spool of fiber. From here, the carpet-making process can begin in earnest.

Most carpets today are tufted, or woven into closed loops. This method was developed in Dalton, Georgia — the carpet capital of the world — around the turn of the 20th century. Here’s how it works: A needle pushes carpet fibers through the bottom of a fabric called the carpet backing. A hook, known as a looper, holds the fibers in place while the needle retracts, forming the loop. While this process may sound a bit tedious, it was even more so before automated tufting machines were introduced. Today, these machines, which are about 12 feet (3.65 meters) wide, operate with 800 to 1,200 needles working together to quickly and steadily create carpet [source: Carpeteria].

If the carpet being made is tufted, the process ends here. However, if the carpet is cut pile, the tufted carpet goes through an additional step. In this step, the loopers that hold the pile strands are drawn over sharp knives, which cut the loops into the individual strands that form a cut pile carpet.

The coloring process can occur at various stages during production, depending on the desired final look. As mentioned earlier, some carpets are immersed in vats of boiling water where dyes are added, a method known as the Beck process. Another technique, continuous dyeing, involves rolling and spraying dyes onto the finished carpet. A third approach, pre-dyeing, occurs before the carpet is woven. In this case, the yarn used for tufting is dyed before the process, ensuring a consistent color throughout.

After the carpet is complete, it undergoes washing, drying, and vacuuming. Any stray piles are trimmed, and the carpet is sent along a conveyor belt where a final worker uses a pile gun to fill in any bare spots. The carpet is now ready for use.

Seems simple enough, but what happens once you’ve used the carpet and are ready to dispose of it? How does one go about recycling old carpet? Find out on the next page.

What to Do With Used Carpet

By now, you’ve likely realized that carpet isn’t just a roll of fabric that comes from a machine. It consists of multiple parts: backing, fibers, and padding once installed. Each of these components is made of different materials. Carpet fibers are typically synthetic, such as polypropylene, polyester, or nylon, though natural fibers like wool or cotton are sometimes used. The backing is usually made of woven PVC or latex, while padding is typically foam rubber.

Unfortunately, a whole used carpet cannot be recycled as a single piece due to the different materials mixing together. The good news is that these individual components can be separated and recycled. The downside is that carpet recycling, in its current state, can be expensive, and finding carpet recycling centers can be a challenge.

The high cost of carpet recycling is mainly due to the time and effort it takes to break the carpet down into its basic materials. Currently, the process can cost anywhere between five to 25 cents per pound [source: CARE]. Anyone who has ever tried to lift a roll of carpet knows that the costs quickly add up when recycling is involved.

Nevertheless, recycling old carpet is far more sustainable than simply sending it to a landfill. The Carpet America Recovery Effort (CARE) recommends contacting a carpet dealer for those looking to recycle. CARE aims to ensure that up to 40 percent of old carpeting is recycled by 2012. While it may cost consumers some money, the recycled carpet can be used in a variety of products such as manufactured stone, car parts, and roof shingles. Who knows? A house undergoing a renovation could have new carpet on its floors and recycled carpet on its roof.