Effects of sportswear design on thermal comfort

• Author(s): Abreu, Maria José Araújo Marques ; Catarino, André P. ; Cardoso, Cidália ; Martin, Elisabeth
• Date: 2011
• Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/1822/15155
• Origin: RepositóriUM - Universidade do Minho
• Subject(s): Thermal comfort; Garment design; Knitting structure; Thermal manikin
• Document Type: Conference Object
• Language: English

Description

ISBN 978-2-7466-2858-8 Several technical developments in the sportswear clothing industry resulted in the use of functional textiles for highly-specialized performances in all kind of sports. This paper reports on an experimental investigation on the effects of garment design in thermo-physiological body comfort, measured in terms of clothing insulation for a specific outdoor sport - rowing. The thermal manikins have been used to measure clothing insulation and to evaluate the thermal comfort. Thermal manikins provide a good estimate of the total dry heat loss from the body and the distribution of heat flow over the body surface. In a standard environment, these measurements can be used to describe the thermal characteristics of clothing. Testing of sportswear clothing made of different fibers and garment designs, namely by varying knitting structures, show the possibilities of influencing thermal comfort, especially thermal insulation. The evaluation and understanding of the thermal effects of garment design and fabric materials is important for the development and optimization of functional garments. Therefore, the final aim of this paper is to study and validate the thermal comfort behaviour of active sportswear for rowing using single and multiple knitted zones in the garment design and considering also differences in material composition through thermal manikin measurements.