Occasionally we receive calls from customers saying that the pins on the large drum are bending or breaking off. This lowers the life expectancy of your drum carder, and can cause difficulties during the carding process. There are two primary causes for this situation, but fear not, we have solutions to keep your carder in good health!

Issue 1: The Drums are Touching

Most of the time it’s that the drums (the infeed drum and the large drum) are touching each other. It’s important that the two drums DO NOT touch. This is often indicated by a “crunching” noise as you card. This inter-meshing of pins causes the “ripping” action, and can break pins off or bend them severely.

The Solution!

Remember the booklet that came with your drum carder? In it, you’ll find instructions on how to adjust the drum spacing, or you can watch the video below featuring our Petite drum carder. Don’t worry if you lost your manual – we have PDF versions for each model here on our website: http://www.strauchfiber.com/help/operation-manuals.php.

If you ignore the noise, here’s what’s going to happen:

Yikes! Better set aside a few minutes to do a routine drum check before your next carding session!

Issue 2: Improper use of the Doffer Brush

The second cause of pin loss is improper use of the doffer brush used to clean the large drum – this should ALWAYS be in a downward motion. If you take a closer look at the drum, you will notice that all of the pins curve downward. Hence, so should your movement when using the doffer brush. If it helps, think of this as “going with the grain.”

Moving the doffer sideways or upwards (or against the grain, if you prefer) will bend the pins and could even result in breakage.

We have more videos on YouTube demonstrating how to use your doffer brush, and please subscribe while you’re there!