Electromagnetic and electrostatic shielding properties of co-weaving-knitting fabrics reinforced composites

The rotor twister successfully fabricated a series of hybrid conductive yarns. Copper wire and polyamide filament were used as the core yam, and stainless steel wire was used as the wrapping yam to fabricate the loop yarns for knitting structure. The nonwoven selvedge served as the core yarn, and the conducting wire was used as the wrapping yarn, to fabricate the weft-inlaid yam. The co-weaving-knitting machine was used successfully in this study to fabricate the conducting co-weaving-knitting fabrics (CWKFs) with the hybrid yam. The conducting materials of the hybrid yam were copper wire and stainless steel wire, taken as the wrapping and core yarn, respectively. The CWKFs were laminated with various angles in four layers, and then were heat pressed for 3 mm in thickness. This study examined the surface resistivity, electromagnetic shielding effectiveness and electrostatic discharge attenuation percentage of the CWKFs reinforced composites. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.