A novel stress-freezing technique for studying the compressional behavior of woven fabrics

This paper describes a novel experimental approach to assessing fabric structural geometry under compression, and presents a study of some typical technical fabrics. The method employs a "stress-freezing" technique, where a fabric sample, impregnated with a clear resin, is subjected to compressive stress and held under load while the resin cures (at room temperature). Image analysis of the cured specimens enables various fabric geometric parameters to be derived, which cannot be determined from existing mechanical test methods such as KES-F. The new technique is, however, validated by comparing the fabric thickness versus pressure relationships with compression data obtained on equivalent fabrics with KES-F. The variation with applied pressure of the identified geometric parameters is determined using a series of woven fabrics of differing structures and yarn specifications. The results are interpreted in terms of a simple compression model.