This invention concerns the production of so called "hand tufted rugs",
carpets and wall hangings by use a "tufting machine" which employs a
single hollow needle through which yarn is fed into a backing fabric, to
form tufts of yarn. The machine comprises a yarn cutter, in the tufting
head, which is selectively operable to cause the tufts to be cut or loop
pile. A computer operated motion control system is operable under the
control of a machine readable tufting design pattern comprising a series
of vectors and associated control codes, to drive the tufting gun as
follows: (a) to operate the mechanism and reciprocate the needle to
insert tufts into backing fabric. (b) to operate the movement system and
move the needle across a two-dimensional plane while inserting tufts, in
accordance with the vectors. (c) to lift and lower the foot, in
accordance with respective control codes. And, (d) to selectively operate
the yarn cutter, in accordance with respective control codes.