Rippled papermaking fabrics for creped and uncreped tissue manufacturing processes

1. A woven fabric for a papermaking machine, said fabric comprising a textured sheet contacting surface having substantially continuous machine-direction ripples separated by valleys, said ripples being formed of multiple warp strands grouped together and supported by multiple shute strands of two or more diameters, the fabric being a single layer fabric and having a cross-machine direction bending stiffness from about 20 to about 80 N·m.

2. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples have a width of between approximately 1.3 to 3 mm.

3. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples have a frequency of occurrence in a cross-machine direction of the fabric of between approximately 2 to 8 ripples per centimeter.

4. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, said ripples being wider than the individual warp strands.

5. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, said ripples being higher than the individual warp strands.

6. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, said ripples being wider and higher than individual said warp strands.

7. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in the machine direction and wherein at least one warp strand participates exclusively in a structure of a ripple.

8. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, and wherein at least one said warp strand participates exclusively in a structure of at least one said valley.

9. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, and wherein no individual said warp strand concurrently participates in a structure of at least one said ripple and participates in a structure of at least one said valley.

10. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein each individual warp strand concurrently participates in both the structure of said ripples and the structure of said valleys.

11. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples comprise multiple individual warp strands substantially oriented in a machine direction, and wherein each individual warp strand concurrently participates in both the structure of said ripples and the structure of said valleys.

12. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said fabric is warp-dominant.

13. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said fabric is co-planar.

14. The fabric of claim 1 , wherein said ripples have a depth of at least 0.8 mm.

15. The fabric of claim 14 , wherein said ripples have a depth of between approximately 0.85 to 1.0 mm.

16. A woven papermaking fabric having a textured sheet contacting surface comprising substantially continuous machine-direction ripples separated by valleys, said ripples being formed of multiple warp strands grouped together, said ripples having a depth of between approximately 250 to 300 percent of a warp strand diameter, the fabric being a single layer fabric and having a cross-machine direction bending stiffness from about 20 to about 80 N·m.

17. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said ripples having a width of less than 3 mm.

18. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said ripple depth is between approximately 105 to 120 percent of a sum of the warp and weighted-average shute diameters.

19. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said fabric comprises a forming fabric for use in a wet-laid papermaking process.

20. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said fabric comprises a through-air-drying fabric for use in a wet-laid papermaking process.

21. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said fabric comprises a transfer fabric.

22. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said fabric is configured for imparting a cross-machine direction molding strain of about 20 to 25 percent.

23. The fabric of claim 16 , wherein said fabric is one of an impression and through-air-drying fabric for conveying a web through a pressure-roll nip to a Yankee dryer in a wet-laid papermaking process.

24. The fabric of claim 23 , wherein, wherein said impression fabric has a frequency of occurence of the fabric ripples, and is configured for contacting the Yankee dryer in substantially continuous machine-direction bands with a frequency of occurence corresponding to said frequency of occurence of the fabric ripples.

25. The fabric of claim 23 , wherein said fabric includes a post-treatment in the form of sanding to improve contact area.

26. A single layer, woven fabric having at least 40 features per square inch, and a textured sheet contacting surface having a z-direction depth of at least 0.8 mm, the fabric being a single layer fabric and having a cross-machine direction bending stiffness from about 20 to about 80 N·m.

27. The fabric of claim 26 , having warp strands with respective diameters less than 0.4 mm.

28. The fabric of claim 26 , having a z-direction depth greater than a diameter of an individual warp strand.

29. A woven papermaking fabric having a textured sheet contacting surface comprising substantially continuous ripples aligned at an angle to a machine direction and separated by valleys, said ripples being formed of multiple warp strands grouped together and supported by multiple shute strands of two or more diameters, wherein the warp strands are substantially oriented in the machine direction and wherein each individual warp strand participates in both a structure of said ripples and a structure of said valleys, the fabric being a single layer fabric and having a cross-machine direction bending stiffness from about 20 to about 80 N·m.

30. A woven papermaking fabric having a textured sheet contacting surface comprising substantially continuous ripples aligned at a variable angle to a machine direction and separated by valleys, said ripples being formed of multiple warp strands grouped together and supported by multiple shute strands of two or more diameters, wherein the warp strands are substantially oriented in the machine direction and wherein each individual warp strand participates in both a structure of said ripples and a structure of said valleys, and wherein said variable angle of said fabric ripple regularly reverses direction in terms of traversing the cross-machine direction to thereby create a wavy-like appearance, the fabric being a single layer fabric and having a cross-machine direction bending stiffness from about 20 to about 80 N·m.