Effect of inlaid elastic yarns and inlay pattern on physical properties and compression behaviour of weft-knitted spacer fabric

Spacer fabrics are commonly used as cushioning materials. Their compression properties are one of the most important concerns in determining their specific end-use. Therefore, it is time and cost- efficient to have another means available that could allow quick and easy modifications to the compression behaviour of spacer fabrics and control them too. In this study, a method that uses an elastic inlay is adopted to modify the physical and compression properties of spacer fabrics. Fifteen samples constructed with different spacer structures and inlay yarns and patterns were fabricated and then evaluated. The results show that spacer fabrics with different thicknesses, densities and compression behaviours can be obtained by using different inlay patterns and elastic yarns. Increasing the number of miss stitches in the inlay pattern can help to increase the thickness and stiffness of spacer fabric and withstand a higher compression strength. However, when the number of miss stitches further increases to 3 miss stitches between every tuck stitch, the irregularity of the spacer structure would increase and could show adverse effects to certain spacer structures. The spacer fabric made by incorporating an elastic inlay can retain air permeability and a lower fabric weight than that made by the knit stitches of elastic yarns together with the surface yarns. By changing the inlay pattern, a spacer fabric with different compression behaviours in different areas of the same fabric can be realised. This novel method can increase the flexibility of creating a spacer fabric with the desired properties.