Evaluating the effect of textile material and structure for printable and wearable e-textiles
Evaluating the effect of textile material and structure for printable and wearable e-textiles
During the fabrication of printed e-textile devices, it is often necessary to print a low-cost polymer interface layer to level the surface of the fabrics. The typical thickness of this interface layer is usually greater than the thickness of the fabric. This significantly affects the flexibility and wearability of the printed e-textile. This paper investigates the thickness reduction of the interface layer by studying the effect of the textile material and its thread count on the surface roughness and thickness of the printed interface. This is achieved by screen printing a polyurethane interface layer on fabrics of five different fabric materials and thread counts. The results show that the surface roughness of the fabrics and the printed interface layer thickness reduce at higher thread counts. More importantly, the thickness of the interface layer significantly reduces with the use of fabrics with high polyester content. A $50~\mu \text{m}$ thick polyurethane interface layer with a surface roughness, ${R}_{a}$ value of $1.7~\mu \text{m}$ is reported on a 100% plain weave polyester fabric. The PU thickness is 4 times less than the state of the art and shows more than 80 % reduction in the proportion of interface material to fabric thickness of the printed e-textile. This minimizes the impact of the printed film on the fabric.
Fabrics, Polyurethane interface layer, Printed e-textiles, Printing, Rough surfaces, Surface roughness, Surface treatment, Textiles, Yarn, fabric thread count, printed films, screen printing, surface roughness
18263-18270
Komolafe, Abiodun
5e79fbab-38be-4a64-94d5-867a94690932
Glanc-Gostkiewicz, Monika
fde22742-587f-4688-9f3a-2596457c1669
Nunes Matos, Helga
d57bf886-addc-4f55-ad10-3a947248aea8
Torah, Russel
7147b47b-db01-4124-95dc-90d6a9842688
15 August 2021
Komolafe, Abiodun
5e79fbab-38be-4a64-94d5-867a94690932
Glanc-Gostkiewicz, Monika
fde22742-587f-4688-9f3a-2596457c1669
Nunes Matos, Helga
d57bf886-addc-4f55-ad10-3a947248aea8
Torah, Russel
7147b47b-db01-4124-95dc-90d6a9842688
Komolafe, Abiodun, Glanc-Gostkiewicz, Monika, Nunes Matos, Helga and Torah, Russel
(2021)
Evaluating the effect of textile material and structure for printable and wearable e-textiles.
IEEE Sensors Journal, 21 (16), , [9446849].
(doi:10.1109/JSEN.2021.3086235).
Abstract
During the fabrication of printed e-textile devices, it is often necessary to print a low-cost polymer interface layer to level the surface of the fabrics. The typical thickness of this interface layer is usually greater than the thickness of the fabric. This significantly affects the flexibility and wearability of the printed e-textile. This paper investigates the thickness reduction of the interface layer by studying the effect of the textile material and its thread count on the surface roughness and thickness of the printed interface. This is achieved by screen printing a polyurethane interface layer on fabrics of five different fabric materials and thread counts. The results show that the surface roughness of the fabrics and the printed interface layer thickness reduce at higher thread counts. More importantly, the thickness of the interface layer significantly reduces with the use of fabrics with high polyester content. A $50~\mu \text{m}$ thick polyurethane interface layer with a surface roughness, ${R}_{a}$ value of $1.7~\mu \text{m}$ is reported on a 100% plain weave polyester fabric. The PU thickness is 4 times less than the state of the art and shows more than 80 % reduction in the proportion of interface material to fabric thickness of the printed e-textile. This minimizes the impact of the printed film on the fabric.
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Published date: 15 August 2021
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Funding Information:
Manuscript received April 6, 2021; revised May 19, 2021; accepted May 28, 2021. Date of publication June 4, 2021; date of current version August 13, 2021. This work was supported by the WEARPLEX Project through the Horizon 2020 EU funding–ICT-02-2018 under Grant 825339. This article was presented at the 2020 IEEE International conference on Flexible and Printable Sensors and Systems (FLEPS). The associate editor coordinating the review of this article and approving it for publication was Dr. Jürgen Kosel. (Corresponding author: Abiodun O. Komolafe.) Abiodun O. Komolafe, Helga Nunes-Matos, and Russel N. Torah are with the School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, U.K. (e-mail: a.o.komolafe@soton.ac.uk).
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© 2001-2012 IEEE.
Keywords:
Fabrics, Polyurethane interface layer, Printed e-textiles, Printing, Rough surfaces, Surface roughness, Surface treatment, Textiles, Yarn, fabric thread count, printed films, screen printing, surface roughness
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 449642
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/449642
ISSN: 1530-437X
PURE UUID: d7a36f7c-f7e5-403f-abf8-1412785e3bde
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Date deposited: 10 Jun 2021 16:30
Last modified: 18 Apr 2024 01:45
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Author:
Abiodun Komolafe
Author:
Helga Nunes Matos
Author:
Russel Torah
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