Our Services

Service Request Forms

Test Request forms for various AWTA Ltd services are now available as downloads from this website.

AWTA Ltd was established with the specific purpose of providing an independent testing service to measure the Moisture Content of Scoured & Carbonised Wool for the Australian wool industry.

Yield & Diameter

This was a major step forward, but it created a need for an objective test for the Yield of clean fibre in Greasy Wool. Internationally accepted sampling and testing procedures were developed.

Staple Length & Strength

While the availability of objective measurements for Yield, Vegetable Matter and Mean Fibre Diameter improved many aspects of the prediction of processing performance, it was acknowledged that it is also influenced by other parameters, of which Staple Length & Strength were considered to be the most important.

Average Yellowness

Average Yellowness is an important characteristic of wool because it is related to dyeing performance and it is not necessarily related to the colour of Greasy Wool.

Dark & Medullated Fibres

A Dark & Medullated Fibre service was introduced in 2003, in response to a demand for such a service to measure contamination of merino wool by non-merino breeds. This service is still being developed, with an active research program being funded by Australian Wool Innovations to develop more efficient testing systems.

Fleece Measurement

AWTA Ltd introduced a Fleece Measurement service in 1971, providing breeders and growers with Yield & Mean Fibre Diameter results for individual animals from submitted mid-side fleece samples.

Pesticide Residue Analysis

AWTA Ltd has an agreement with CSIRO TFT to provide analysis on the residual level of chemicals remaining after Lice, Fly and ectoparsite treatments.

Electronic Services

AWTA Ltd has been a leader in the use of Electronic Data Processing for the conduct of its day-to-day business and to provide a range of information based services to its clients.

Research & Development

The Research & Development Division is the largest privately operated such group in the wool industry. It conducts research on matters directly related to AWTA Ltd's business as well as providing consultancy services to the industry.

Equipment Manufacture

The Research and Development Division contains within skills and equipment for developing, manufacturing and maintaining all the equipment that is used within the company's three laboratories. This equipment is also manufactured and sold to other laboratories or educational institutions.

Topmark

TOPMARK is a free benchmarking service for processing mills and topmakers around the world. Participation is very simple, with mills providing AWTA Ltd with greasy wool test information on their batches as well as their own processing test data. AWTA Ltd collates the data from all participating mills and determines ‘benchmarks’ for all the major processing results. These benchmarks allow each participating mill to confidentially compare its performance against the average of all the other mills participating in this program.

Publications

AWTA Ltd produces a range of publications which it distributes to its clients and other interested parties.  Increasingly these publications are electronic.  It is the Company's policy to make all its publications available on this site. Where practical, publications can be viewed as web pages, but in all instances where this is not practical they are available in PDF format. Publications produced by third parties, but deemed to be of value to the industry, are also included, after the author's permission has been provided.

Accreditations

AWTA Ltd has achieved an international reputation for its technical standards.

Subscription Services

AWTA Ltd provides the facility for clients and other interested parties to subscribe to a public email newsletter. This is distributed to all subscribers to the the list at regular intervals. and provides very brief notes on matters relating to wool testing, wool production and other issues of interest. Where relevant, links to AWTA Ltd's or other websites to documents containing more detailed information are provided.

Textiles

The Textiles Division of AWTA Ltd was born out of the desire of the former Statutory AWTA to provide a comprehensive testing service from wool fibre through to finished product. The Division was originally involved in all the testing of scoured wool, wool top, yarns and fabrics. It only tested wool textiles. Over the years, the requirement to test only wool and wool textiles was relaxed to allow, first, wool blends and then non-wool textiles. It was found that there was a market for the testing of non-wool products and the services offered by the Division were gradually expanded such that by the early 1970's the Division was providing a testing service for all textiles and the fire performance testing of other products including building materials.

Geotextile & Other Materials

Through the 1980's and 1990's the services offered by the Division were further expanded to include a wider range of materials such as personal flotation devices (life jackets), non-textile floor coverings, flexible air-conditioning ducting and aircraft seating materials for fire performance.

Automotive Components

The Division has further expanded the range of services offered to include automotive components. This includes most materials used inside the passenger compartment of the car and some external components.

Accreditations

AWTA Textile Testing holds an extensive range of accreditations for the testing that it conducts. The Division is accredited by the National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia (NATA) to ISO 17025 in the fields of Mechanical Testing, Chemical Testing and Heat & Temperature Measurement (Fire Testing) for many of the tests conducted. The Division is also certified to ISO 9001 for its management system. The Division is accredited by Interwoollabs for the conduct of fibre diameter and fibre length testing on wool top and by the International Wool Textile Organisation for condition testing. The International Maritime Organisation (IMO) has accredited the laboratory for certain tests on upholstery and bedding for ships and the International Automobile Federation (FIA) has accredited the laboratory to conduct testing on racing drivers clothing and fuel bladders for racing cars. The Division is the only accredited laboratory in Australasia for these racing car tests. It is also an accredited supplier of testing services for textile materials and apparel products to the retail chain, Target Australia.