Mechanical parameters such as bending rigidity, thickness, compressibility, and coefficient of friction are measured by a sensory method for a series of plain and rib weft knitted structures made from cashmere and polyester textured yarns. The values estimated by the sensory method are found to be in fairly good agreement with the values measured on the KES system. The results of our work indicate that by using a standard and controlling the handling manner, sensory assessments can be as successfully quantified as instrumental measurements. However, detectable differences in each mechanical parameter vary with the sensory assessment, depending on the property being considered. The sensory measurement of fabric thickness yields the most consistent and accurate results. Other parameters such as the bending rigidity, compressibility, and coefficient of friction are also reasonably estimated. In addition, the effectiveness of the sensory measurements is also discussed in terms of knit construction and fiber type.Fabric mechanical properties are tested in two waysinstrumental and sensory. Objectively, they can be tested by instrumental systems such as KES and FAST. The objective tests are accurate, precise, and repeatable, but they are not always used for routine quality control in industry and in trading mainly because of their high cost. Therefore, sensory methods are still widely used for routine textile testing and are currently drawing much greater attention, though they are unstable, uncertain, and lack quantitativeness. In his study, &dquo;Subjective Textile Testing&dquo;, Slater [9] emphasized that sensory tests in which a standard comparison is available are usually more likely to correlate well with objective measures. Further, he suggested that for better subjective testing, theoretically sound methods such as ranking or paired comparison should be used because they are reliable and provide a measure of a specific parameter or property.Among sensory tests, sensory colorimetry is a wellestablished method. The use of a few color standards has been proven to be effective in sensory colorimetry. Whence, the proper method for measuring the mechanical properties should follow the same direction as colorimetry, that is, use of a standard.Studies on the quantitative measurements of mechanical properties by the sensory method are almost nonexistent, except for the method proposed by Matsuo et al.[8] for woven fabrics. Published reports about knitted fabrics are also nearly nonexistent. Therefore, the objective of our work is to quantitatively measure the mechanical parameters of knitted fabrics using a sensory test and to verify its effectiveness. In addition, we believe it will be interesting to find which properties of knits have objectivity in tactile assessments and how accurate those assessments are. ExperimentalFour sets of fabric samples were knitted and used in this work-cashmere plain weft, cashmere rib, PET plain weft, and PET rib. The fabrics of each set provided variations in cover factors and yarn thick...

This work deals with the bending properties of a series of plain and rib weft knitted structures made from cashmere yarns. Additionally, some plain weft knitted fabrics made from polyester textured yarns (PET) are included for comparison. The experimental results are discussed in terms of the structural characteristics (cover factor, fabric weight) and their effects on the bending properties. Theoretical analyses of the effects of yarn bending properties and fabric structure on the bending rigidity and frictional bending moment of the fabrics are based on our straight parallel yarns (SPY) model. In this model, the knitted structure is assumed to consist of a series of straight yarns that have some overlapping regions at the interlocking points. The estimation of fabric bending parameters is based on summing up the bending parameters of these straight yarns, which have some overlapping regions lying in the direction of bending. The estimated values from this model are compared with the values measured on a KES-FB pure bending tester; the predictions are in a reasonable agreement with the experimental data.

In this work, pressure-thickness relation is investigated for a series of plain and rib knitted structures made from cashmere and polyester textured (PET) yarns. The pressure-thickness curve during lateral compression is divided into three regions, namely, the first linear region followed by the non-linear region and second linear region [1]. The portion of these regions and also the slopes of the linear regions are found to differ markedly by knit construction and yarn structure for knit fabrics. A comparison of cashmere and PET knits reveals that the compressibility primarily depends on fiber material. Besides, the compressibility of knitted fabric also depends on the structural parameters of loop length, cover factor and fabric weight.On the other hand, in this study, the compression mechanism of knit fabrics, previously proposed by Postel [2], is modified to describe the experimental data more accurately. It becomes clear that the main structure of the knit fabric begins to deform at the second region of the pressure thickness curve and the main structure and the constituent yarns compressed mainly at the third region.