ELECTRONIC TEXTILE

M.Deekshitha
student from NIFT Textile Design.
A short review on five E-Textile projects.
 Manufacturing of Electronic Textile:
- Sikander Anwar

This article provides the idea of the electronic textile as a fabric on the whole.
An electronic textile is a fabric that has the capacity to conduct electricity if
combined with electronic components. It refers to a textile that incorporates
capabilities of biometric or eternal sensing, power transmission and
interconnection technology.
The properties of e-textile are given which includes flexibility, cheap
manufacturing, thermal resistance, electrical resistance, no wires etc. There are
two types of E-textiles, they are:
(i) the textiles which have devices such as conductors, LED’s, integrated circuits
in the garment.
(ii) the second one is the E-textile with electronic integrated directly into the
textile.
Manufacturing of E-textile is done by coating a thread with metals like silver
or copper, It can also be done by containing cotton or nylon fibres with metal
fibres when it is spun. The construction of E-textile includes things such as fabric
kit, axiomatic and flora.
The materials needed are conductive fibres and textiles which are fabrics that
are often plated or oven with metallic elements. Conductive threads and yarns
have wires which conduct the electricity usually connecting the electricity path
to form one point to the other. Conductive coatings are metals that are used to
connect old traditional textiles to electrically conductive materials. Conductive
ink is an ink that conducts electricity by applying it to the textile. Other materials
include:
(i) shape memory alloys
(ii) piezoelectric materials
(iii) thermo- chronic inks
(iv) nano-materials and microfibers.
This article on manufacturing electronic textile gives a clear view of how
E-textiles are made from the beginning till the end.
 “Beating the heat with cooling fabric technology “
- Alice Davies, 12 June 2018

This is an article about an interview of Charles Ross (outdoor industry specialist)

to Alice Davies about developing cooling fabric technologies for sports and
outdoor applications.

Charles Ross starts off by speaking about the importance of cooling the
temperature of sportsmen’s body while doing physical activities. He defined the
mechanisms of cooling fabrics with other members from the Performance
Clothing Research group.
He mentioned the disadvantages of the fabrics which will over cool the user’s
body while the person is not expressing excessive heat. For that, he says “ the
main approaches to achieving a cooling effect are about moving moisture as this
is a very efficient way of transferring heat. That’s why everyone wants to talk
about the efficiency of evaporation when they are developing new
technologies”.
Further, for this achievement of these kinds of fabric, The trend now is
natural fibres and fibres that can offer an array of additional benefits. Ross put
forward this question “what can a fabric do that a finish can’t?’’ Most of them
agreed with Ross but Mark Taylor, from the same centre, argued that “Finishes
change the nature of fabrics and fibres on the base layer and move moisture, but
you can do that mechanically with fibre if you want’’. Likewise, there were a lot
of arguments saying they could rather work with natural fibres rather than
altering a material.
Ross touches on the topic of Noval technologies. Other than fabrics or fibres
which uses chemical finishes, Novel cooling technology is a method that can
absorb excess energy, plasma modification method that can alter fibre surface
properties without chemical finishes. Ross stressed the importance of using
Novel cooling technology in the future and by the older generation. At last, Ross
talks about the testing which happens of multiple factors. He gives an example of
the moisture management texture at the end
 Exploring the roles of textile craft practice in interdisciplinary
E-textiles development through the design of an illuminated safety
cycling jacket.

The introduction of the article says the growth of E-textile in various fields and
how, where E-textile has found its place in various fields. E- textile has been
taken place in media, art, designs etc. Besides all these, the article raises the
question “how can women textile craft practice can be used in the development
and innovation of e-textile products?”.
The production of the cycling jacket included procedures like pattern
designing, embroidery, circuit design, garment design and electronic textile. LED
lights were fixed into the jackets as a strategy for increasing conspicuity and
instability. The micro-pod, supporting yarns and wires were then covered in a
braid using a braiding machine and florescent orange textured multi filmed
polyester yarn.
The first level of developing e- textile involved a sampling approach where
knowledge about the natural qualities of the LED yarns with varied results.
Objects such as props and other visuals aids as the language used by individual
practitioner do not always translate, even within the creative disciplines.
In the end, the writer says the significance of the future works in this jacket
as well as the e-technologies. Certain changes in the jacket such as placing a light
so that the brightness of the LED’s is enhanced, even behind the layer of the
fibre. Such developments and improvements are given at the end of this article
as an encouragement to the new generation.

Solar energy- harvesting E-textiles to power wearable devices

This novel is about energy-harvesting textile, how the textiles are manufactured
with its method and the result of it. Yarns technology crafted by the embedded
miniature solar cells is done by wearing technologies. These embedded cells and
the copper wire interconnections were then covered by a fibrous textile sheath,
comprising packing fibres.
It is solar e-yarns were created by soldering the miniature crystalline silicon
cells in parallel, onto parallel, onto two multi-strand copper wire using a reflow
soldering technique. The white polyester warp yarns are threatened to achieve a
four by one shedding pattern. There are fine fabrics presented in this material.
The changing capacity of e-harvesting fabric is 100mF textile super capacity
bank.
 The test is being conducted to check the comparative behaviour of different
solar energy harvesting fabric. The test is being conducted under sunlight. The
solar fabric was positioned in the t-shirt with the individual solar e-yarns of the
solar fabrics positioned vertically after worn. It was dressed out as a mannequin
and placed outdoors.
The result of the test showed that he white solar energy harvesting fabric and
the commercial available flexible solar panel. The other colours like black and
reflected lower power densities. Therefore, the result showed that the energy
harvesting fabrics were suitable for generating power under natural sunlight.

Inorganic printed LED’s for wearable technology

-James Claypole, Akex Holder, Caittin MeCall, Amy
winters, William Ray and Tim Claypole

This novel informs the readers how inorganic printed electronics has been
developed that allows for high-speed production of solid-state lighting on
flexible substances.
Initially, there were a lot of disadvantages because of low modality, short
lifetime, and difficulty in achieving the required size in printed organic
electronics. Now, a standard film of Ingan is fabricated in heteroepitaxy and
removed to form micro-LED. They are dispersed into the ink so they can be
printed in combination with conductive ink and dielectrics to create robust,
flexible and efficient lamps. These dresses are “experimental rather than
fundamental”.
The base for Ingan experimental deposition is silicon or sapphire wafers.
The 450mm wavelength emitting micro LED structures were then fabricated
using a mask set developed for this purpose. The micro LED’s shape was
developed which would potentially be lit in one direction. A transparent
conductive layer is added to make a vertically connected, randomly space diode.
The LED’s, when ultra-bright, produce distinct points of light, which requires
a diffuser to create a smoother illumination lamp. Smaller air gaps are allowed to
spread light. The garment is composed of a fitted holographic leather and
panelled circle skirt assembled from the eight electronic LED pannels. The
lightning graphic is printed on a substrate that could transport the LED’s light
source. This technology also has potential for application in flexible and display
packaging.