The cotton calender is made up of at least one heated cylinder (with diathermic oil or steam) and cylinders that can rotate with variable speeds different from each other.
The appearance obtained on the fabric depends on the material (synthetic, cotton, paper, etc.) that covers the cylinders that work with the rectified tempered steel cylinder or in pairs with each other.
In a three-roll calendering process, the fabric, packaged in large rolls or stacked on pallets, placed at the front center of the machine, passes:
through a fabric tensioner (see figure A, point 1), by a metal detector (fig. A, 2) which, if it detects metal elements in the fabric, stops the machine, between return cylinders, another tensioner (fig. A , 3) and to a fixed expander (fig. A, 4).
Then the fabric arrives at the calendering unit which is made up of a central heatable steel cylinder (fig. A, 5), a lower cylinder (fig. A, 6) and an upper one (fig. A, 7), both coated with different materials depending on the effect to be obtained on the fabric.
The lower and upper cylinders are controlled independently of each other so, during its path, the fabric can undergo two different pressures on the central cylinder.
The fabric is then collected in a large roll (fig. A, 8), but some machines are also equipped with a folding machine.