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Development of auxetic fabrics using flat knitting technology

Hong Hu, Zhengyue Wang and Su Liu
Textile Research Journal 2011 81: 1493 originally published online 11 May 2011
DOI: 10.1177/0040517511404594

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Original article
Textile Research Journal
81(14) 14931502

Development of auxetic fabrics using flat ! The Author(s) 2011

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knitting technology DOI: 10.1177/0040517511404594
trj.sagepub.com

Hong Hu, Zhengyue Wang and Su Liu

Abstract
Flat knitting is a widely used fabric manufacturing technology. Compared with warp knitting and circular knitting, flat
knitting is characterized by its higher process flexibility and greater fabric structure variety. In this work, flat knitting
technology was exploited to fabricate auxetic fabrics which laterally expand when stretched. Three kinds of geometrical
structures, i.e. foldable structure, rotating rectangle and reentrant hexagon, were employed as basic reference structures
for the development of these kinds of auxetic fabrics. The weft knitting processes based on these structures were
specially developed and auxetic fabrics were fabricated using the computerized flat knitting machines. The Poissons ratio-
strain curves of the developed fabrics were plotted and compared with those calculated using existing models to
demonstrate the variation trends of Poissons ratio with the axial strain. The results reveal that except the folded
fabric formed with the face loops and reverse loops in a rectangular arrangement, of which the auxetic effect firstly
increases and then decreases with the axial strain, the auxetic effects of all other fabrics decrease with an increase of the
axial strain. The work also shows that auxetic fabrics can be realized based on knitted structures and that flat knitting
technology can provide a simple, but highly effective way of fabricating auxetic fabrics from conventional yarns.

Keywords
Auxetic fabric, Poissons ratio, flat knitting, geometrical analysis

Auxetic materials can be manufactured based on dif-

Introduction
Auxetic materials exhibit the negative Poissons ratio
(NPR). They laterally expand when stretched and lat-
erally contract when compressed.1 Apart from such
counter-intuitive behavior, auxetic materials have sev-
eral additional benecial properties including, amongst
others, an improved indentation resistance, making
them suitable to use in protective equipment and an
enhanced ability to form doubly curved surfaces, a
property which is particularly desired in materials
used to construct dome-shaped structures/surfaces
and enhanced acoustic properties, making them suit-
able for sound-proong applications.2
It is known that the auxetic eect of a NPR material
arises from the interplay occurring between the possible
deformation mechanisms associated with the particular
internal geometry of the system, which may be present
in the macrostructure, microstructure, and/or the nano-
structure.3 The geometries such as reentrant struc-
tures,4 chiral structures,5 rotating units,3,6 have been
found to have the auxetic eect.7
ferent material forms including polymers, metals, cera-
mics and composites. In the recent years, the use of
textile technology to fabricate auxetic materials has
attracted some attention. Alderson et al. successfully
produced a kind of auxetic polypropylene (PP) ber by
employing a novel thermal processing technique.8
Ravirala et al. reported a new method to produce auxetic
polyester bers.9 Evans and Hook adopted an alterna-
tive approach to produce a multilament construction,
in which a high-stiness lament is wrapped helically
around a thicker low-stiness lament.10 Miller et al.
applied a novel double-helix yarn to make a woven
textile structure for producing auxetic composite.11
Institute of Textiles and Clothing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University,
Hong Kong.
Corresponding author:
Hong Hu, Institute of Textiles and Clothing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic
University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Email: tchuhong@polyu.edu.hk

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1494
Lee et al. invented an auxetic ber which not only
responds to the external force, but also responds to the
moisture by using a moisture activated shrinking la-
ment.12 Ugbolue et al. presented a technique for produc-
ing warp-knitted auxetic structures using chain and
lling yarn inlays.13 While, Atarbuck et al. patented
the warp-knitted fabrics having auxetic eect.14 Most
recently, Liu and Hu have produced a kind of weft-
knitted auxetic fabric based on a geometrical analysis
of a Miura-ori pattern.15 The development of auxetic
textiles broadens their potential applications, which
include fabrics that change color with tension, threads
with knots that do not slip, dental oss with in-built drug
release, and various blast-protection devices, etc.
This paper reports a study of using at knitting tech-
nology as an alternative method for fabricating auxetic
fabrics. Various auxetic fabrics knitted on a computer-
ized at knitting machine based on dierent kinds of
geometries which can achieve auxetic eect are pre-
sented. At the same time, the knitting processes and
auxetic eect of these fabrics are also demonstrated
and discussed.
Knitting abilities of a computerized flat
knitting machine
Knitting is a common process of manufacturing fabric
structures by loop formation. In modern times, knitting
technology is widely used in many areas such as appa-
rel, domestic and industrial end-uses. Compared with
other knitting technologies such as warp knitting and
circular knitting, at knitting is characterized by its
high process exibility and great fabric structure vari-
ety. The knitting abilities of a computerized at knit-
ting machine which can be exploited to fabricate the
auxetic fabrics include:
. individual needle selection;
. loop transfer including binding-o technique;
Microscope
Computer
Clamp
Ruler
Figure 1. Schematic presentation of testing device.
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Textile Research Journal 81(14)
. knitting of dierent kinds of stitches in the same
knitting course, such as normal stitches, tuck stitches
and miss stitches;
. racking and intarsia;
. easy adjustment of knitting parameters during knit-
ting process, such as loop length, yarn tension, fabric
take-down tension, yarn carrier change and machine
speed.
In this study, both Stoll CMS822 E7.2 and
Stoll CMS530 E3.5.2 computerized at knitting
machines were used to knit auxetic fabrics based on
the three dierent kinds of geometrical structures, i.e.,
foldable structure, rotating rectangle and reentrant
hexagon.
Measurement of Poissons ratio
The Poissons ratio (v) of a material is dened as the
negative ratio of the transverse strain to the axial
strain in the direction of loading. To obtain the
Poissons ratio (v) of the fabrics developed, a KES
tensile testing device equipped with a microscope
was used to test the fabric under the uni-axial load-
ing condition. As shown in Figure 1, while the axial
strain was directly given by the KES testing system,
the transverse strain of the fabric was obtained
by calculating the distance change of two marked
points recorded by the microscope. The ruler
moving simultaneously with the marked points pro-
vided a reading reference of the distance values
between the two points marked. The Poissons
ratio (v) was then calculated according to the follow-
ing equation:
v "t ="a 1
where "t and "a are the transverse strain and axial
strain, respectively.
Marks Tensile
direction
Clamp
Hu et al.
Auxetic fabrics developed and their
auxetic effect
Auxetic fabrics developed based on foldable
structures
The principle of using foldable structures to create an
auxetic eect is that a folded structure can be unfolded
when stretched in one direction. A foldable knitted
structure can be produced by combining face and
reverse loops. In our previous paper,15 a Miura-ori
pattern formed with parallelogram planes of the same
shape and size was used to fabricate auxetic fabrics by
the arrangement of face loops and reverse loops in a
zigzag form. Other two auxetic fabrics fabricated with
dierent arrangements of face and reverse loops on a
Stoll CMS822 E7.2 machine are presented here.
The rst example is an auxetic fabric made through
an alternate arrangement of the face and reverse loops
in rectangle forms. The knitting pattern is shown in
Figure 2. Auxetic fabric formed with the arrangement of face and reverse loops in rectangular forms. a) Knitting pattern, b) fabric at
the free state, c) fabric at the stretched state, d) Poissons ratio vs. strain.
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1495
Figure 2a in which the bordered area represents the
smallest repeating unit cell. The change between the
face loops and the reverse loops was made by loop
transfer and this could be easily done on a computer-
ized at knitting machine. The fabric knitted with
15/1 Nm 100% lambs wool yarn at the free and
stretched states is shown in Figure 2b and c, respec-
tively. During the knitting process, the knitted fabric
was in a planar form. However, after knitting, the
fabric became folded due to structural disequilibrium
of the face loops and reverse loops. As the auxetic eect
of the fabric was only found in one fabric principal
direction, only the Poissons ratio-strain curve of the
fabric when stretched in the course direction is shown
in Figure 2d. It can be found that the variation of the
Poissons ratio (PR) is not monotonic. The PR values
rstly decrease and then increase with an increase of the
axial strain. The reason is that the extending of the
folded fabric in the course direction can lead to gradual
expansions of the fabric in the wale direction at the
1496 Textile Research Journal 81(14)

initial stage, which leads to an increase of the auxetic
eect. However, with an increase of the axial strain, the
expansion eect of the fabric in the transverse direction
starts to decrease as the fabric becomes more planar,
which leads to a decrease of the auxetic eect. Thus, the
curve in a parabolic form is obtained. It is also found
that the auxetic eect is obtained in a large range of the
axial strain (until 240%) because high strain is needed
to totally open this folded fabric. It is necessary to point
out that in a unit cell, the number of the courses and
wales is not the same. This may aect the auxetic eect
of the fabric. In this regard, when designing an auxetic
fabric with this kind of structure, the number of courses
and wales in a unit cell should be taken into
consideration.
The second example is an auxetic fabric made
through an arrangement of the face and reverse loops
in horizontal and vertical stripes. The knitting pattern
of the smallest repeating unit cell is shown in Figure 3a.
The fabric knitted with 30/2 Nm 100% mercerized wool
yarn at the free and stretched states is shown in
Figure 3b and c, respectively. Dierent from the
above fabric, the auxetic eect of this fabric can be
obtained in two principal directions, so that two PR-
strain curves are shown in Figure 3d. It can be found
that the auxetic eect when extended in the course
direction is higher than that when extended in the
wale direction. The reason is that the stripes along the
wale direction are closer than in the course direction,
which increases more transverse expansion eect when
extended along the course direction. It can be also
found that the auxetic eects decrease with an increase
of the strain for both directions. This is because with an
increase of loading, the axial strain increase is faster
than in the transverse strain due to the yarn transfer
from the transverse direction to the axial direction.
Also, the number of the stripes in a unit cell can
aect the auxetic eect of the fabric. For the rst
fabric shown in Figure 2b, the folded eect is so high
that the auxetic eect increases at the initial stage as the

Figure 3. Auxetic fabric formed with the arrangement of face and reverse loops in horizontal and vertical stripes. a) Knitting pattern,
b) fabric at the free state, c) fabric at the stretched state, d) Poissons ratio vs. strain.

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Hu et al.
opening eect of the folded structure is higher than
fabric deformation. However, for this fabric, as the
folded eect is less, the auxetic eect immediately
decreases from the beginning of extension. Besides,
the auxetic eect of this fabric is achieved in a smaller
range of the axial strain (45% in the course direction
and 62% in the wale direction) as the folded eect
is less.
Auxetic fabrics developed based on
rotating rectangles
Several studies have shown that an auxetic eect can be
achieved using rotating units such as squares,16,17 rect-
angles,18 triangles,19 rhombi20,21 and parallelo-
grams.21,22 An arrangement involving rigid rectangles
connected together at their vertices by hinges is illus-
trated in Figure 4, in which the rotation of the rectangle
units can lead to an auxetic eect when stretched in one
direction. According to the geometrical analysis, the
PR, v, and axial strain, "a, of the structure formed
with rigid rectangles can be theoretically calculated
from the following equations:
asin0  sin bcos0  cosacos0 bsin0

acos  cos0 bsin  sin0 asin0 bcos0
2 extended in the course direction. Thus, only the PR-
a cos  b sin 
"a 1
a cos 0 b sin 0
where a and b are the width and height of the rectangle,
 is the half angle between the two adjacent rectangles
in the height direction, 0 is the initial value of .
Based on the same geometrical arrangement, an
auxetic fabric was produced on a Stoll CMS530
E3.5.2 machine. The knitting process is shown in
Figure 5a. The fabric at the free and stretched states
is shown in Figure 5b and c. The key technique for
a
b
Tensile direction
Figure 4. Connection of rotating rectangles at their vertices.
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1497
knitting this structure was to use the great partial-knit-
ting power of the computerized at knitting machine to
continuously knit individual rectangle units along the
course direction and to make them connected together
at their vertices in the same way shown in Figure 4. The
partial knitting means that while some needles knit,
other needles remain out of action but keep or do not
keep the loops on them. The rectangle units were knit-
ted with 15/2 Nm 100% lambs wool yarn in an inter-
lock structure because an interlock structure has good
structure stability. At the same time, the rst knitting
course on empty needles with an interlock structure can
be easily carried out. In order to avoid unraveling and
laddering, the binding-o technique was used to close
the last course of each unit using a high power elastic
rubber yarn. The elastic rubber yarn was also employed
to knit the rst course of each unit and to connect the
neighboring units in the course direction. The use of
elastic rubber yarn for connecting the rectangle units
can increase the recovery capacity of the structure after
release from extension. The initial size of the rigid rect-
angle was a 20 mm and b 17 mm, and the initial
angle, 0, between two adjacent rectangles was 0 .
The structure shown in Figure 4 can lead to the
auxetic eect in two principle directions. However,
the fabric knitted only has the auxetic eect when
strain curve of the fabric extended in this direction is
shown in Figure 5d. The PR-strain curve calculated
3 from equations 2 and 3 using the same geometrical
parameters of the fabric is also shown in Figure 5d
for the comparison. As for the structure formed with
the rigid rectangles the axial strain is limited when 
reaches a critical value, the calculated curve shown in
Figure 5d can only be plotted until about 30% of the
axial strain. Beyond this value, the axial strain calcu-
lated starts to reduce. It can be found that the variation
trends of the PRs between the calculation and measure-
ment are totally opposite. While the auxetic eect
1498 Textile Research Journal 81(14)

Formation sequence of
rectangles using partial-knitting
process
Loops kept for
connecting the
rectangles in the
wale direction

Last course
closed using
binding-off
technique
with elastic
yarn
Interlock
First course knitted on empty
needles with elastic yarn
(a) (b)
Tensile
direction
Wale

Course

(c) (d)

Figure 5. Auxetic fabric formed with rotating rectangles. a) Schematic presentation of knitting process, (b) fabric at the free state, c)
fabric at the stretched state, d) Poissons ratio vs. strain.

measured decrease with an increase of the strain, the
auxetic eect calculated rises with increase of the strain.
Also, the auxetic eect calculated is much higher than
that measured. The main reason is that in the model,
the rectangles are assumed to be rigid and their form is
kept unchanged under loading. At the same time, they
are freely rotated around vertices under loading.
However, in the knitted structure, the rectangles can
be easily changed to the parallelograms. Besides, the
elastic yarns used to connect the rectangles can increase
the axial deformation and the knitting yarn passing
from one rectangle to the next rectangle limits the
free rotation of the rectangles. Another problem is the
slippage eect of the yarns in the knitted structure. All
these lead to the dierent variation trends between the
model prediction and measurement of the knitted
fabric. Thus, a simple geometrical model with rigid
rectangles cannot be used to predict the auxetic eect
of this kind of the fabric.
Auxetic fabrics developed based on
reentrant hexagonal structure
A number of auxetic materials have been found to
be formed with reentrant hexagonal struc-
tures.4,7,22,23 As shown in Figure 6, when a reen-
trant hexagonal structure is stretched in the
horizontal direction, the diagonal ribs 15, 52,
36 and 64 will move to the horizontal disposition,
which leads to an increase of the distance between
point 5 and 6. Consequently, the auxetic eect is
achieved. Based on the geometrical analysis, the
PR, v, and axial strain, "a, of the structure
formed with rigid sides can be theoretically calcu-
lated from the following equations:
b sin 0 cos 0  cos 
 4
a  b cos 0 sin 0  sin 

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Hu et al.
Figure 6. Reentrant hexagonal structure.
sin 
"a 1
sin 0
where a and b are the vertical and inclined ribs lengths
respectively;  is the angle formed between the two
adjacent vertical and inclined ribs; 0 is the initial
value of .
Two auxetic fabrics were developed based on this
geometrical conguration using a Stoll CMS822 E7.2
machine. The rst one was a real reentrant structure
produced using racking and intarsia techniques. The
schematic presentation of knitting process is shown in
Figure 7a. The fabric at the free and stretched states is
shown in Figure 7b and c. The zigzag shape for each
pinstripe was realized through the racking process
based on the Cardigan structure, which is a typical
double-face tuck structure in the at knitting and is
mostly used to form a diagonal eect in the combina-
tion with the alternate movement of the back needle
bed to the left and right directions of one needle
space for every knitting course. The intarsia technique
was used to knit each separated pinstripe with an indi-
vidual yarn carrier. The interlock structure was used to
connect the two neighboring pinstripes and the bind-
ing-o technique was used to close the last knitting
course of each connecting band. As explained above,
the use of interlock structure and binding-o technique
can avoid an unraveling and laddering problem. At the
same time, they facilitate performing the rst knitting
course on empty needles of the connecting bands. The
whole fabric structure was knitted with 24/2 Nm 100%
acrylic yarn. Its initial side length was a 30 mm and
b 25 mm and the initial angle, 0, was 55 . As the
fabric knitted only has the auxetic eect when extended
in the fabric forming direction, only the PR-strain curve
of the fabric extended in this direction is shown in
Figure 7d. The PR-strain curve calculated from equa-
tions 4 and 5 using the same geometrical parameters of
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1499
the fabric is also shown in Figure 7d for comparison.
As in the geometrical model, the maximum axial strain
5
is limited at  90 , the calculated curve shown in
Figure 7d can only be plotted until about 20% of the
axial strain. It can be found that the variation trends of
the PRs between the calculation and measurement are
totally opposite. While the auxetic eect measured
decreases with an increase of the strain, the calculated
auxetic eect rises with an increase of the strain. Also,
the calculated auxetic eect is much higher than that
measured. This is normal because in the calculation, all
sides of the re-entrant hexagon are assumed to be rigid
and can be freely rotated around their connecting
points. However, in the fabric, the rotations around
the connecting points are very limited due to loop
connection. In addition, the length of each rib side of
the fabric can be easily deformed under loading. All
these lead to the dierent variation trends between
the calculation and measurement of the real knitted
fabric.
The second auxetic fabric was a pseudo-reentrant
hexagonal structure produced using sectional relief
ridges in the combination with elastic yarn. The knit-
ting process presented by using knitting thread notation
is shown in Figure 8a. The fabric in the free and
stretched states is shown in Figure 8b and c. Dierent
from the above reentrant hexagonal auxetic fabric, this
fabric is a close structure. As shown in Figure 8a, the
reentrant hexagonal geometrical conguration is
achieved by both sectional relief ridges and oat elastic
yarns. While the section relief ridges form the upper
and lower horizontal sides of each reentrant hexagon,
two lateral sides eect is achieved due to shrinkage of
the oat elastic yarns on the back of the fabric.
Changing the yarn oat length and relief eect, dier-
ent reentrant hexagonal geometrical forms could be
obtained. The yarns used for the face side and back
side were 24/2 Nm 100% acrylic yarn and KN 20/70
Dupont Lycra yarn, respectively. The initial side
1500 Textile Research Journal 81(14)

Pinstripe1 Pinstripe2 Pinstripe N

knitted with knitted with knitted with
yarn guide1 yarn guide2 yarn guide N

Fabric forming direction

Inverse of
racking
direction

Connecting band
knitted with interlock
structure

Pinstripe knitted based on Cardigan structure

(b)
(a)
Tensile
direction
Course

Wale
(c) (d)

Figure 7. Auxetic fabric formed with real reentrant hexagonal structure. a) Schematic presentation of knitting process, b) fabric at
the free state, c) fabric at the stretched state, d) Poissons ratio vs. strain.

length of a pseudo-reentrant hexagon was a 8 mm
and b 5 mm and the initial angle, 0, was 60 .
The PR-strain curves of the fabric are shown in
Figure 8d. As the fabric knitted only has the auxetic
eect when extended in the wale direction, only the PR-
strain curve extended in this direction is presented. The
PR-strain curve calculated from equations 4 and 5
using the same geometrical parameters of the fabric is
also shown in Figure 8d for comparison. As in the geo-
metrical model, the maximum axial strain is limited at
 90 , the calculated curve shown in Figure 8d can
only be plotted until about 13% of the axial strain. It
can be found that variation trends of the PRs between
the calculation and measurement are totally opposite.
While the measured auxetic eect decreases with an
increase of the strain, the calculated auxetic eect
rises with an increase of the strain. Also, the calculated
auxetic eect is much higher than that measured. This
phenomenon can be explained by the fact that in the
calculation, all sides of the re-entrant hexagon are
assumed to be rigid and can be freely rotated around
their connecting points. However, in the fabric, the
rotations around the connecting points are very limited
due to a close fabric structure. In addition, the length of
each rib side of the fabric can be easily deformed under
loading. The yarn slippage eect within the fabric struc-
ture can also increase the axial strain, which lowers the
auxetic eect of the fabric. All these factors lead to the
opposite variation trends between the calculation and
measurement of real knitted fabric.
Conclusion
A series of auxetic weft-knitted fabrics has been devel-
oped based on the three kinds of geometrical structures,
i.e., foldable structure, rotating rectangles and reen-
trant hexagons, and has been produced using comput-
erized at knitting machines. Good auxetic eects are
obtained with these fabrics. The PR-strain curves show
that the NPRs vary with the strain for all the fabrics.
Except the rst folded fabric, of which the auxetic eect
rstly increases and then decreases with the axial strain,

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Hu et al. 1501

Figure 8. Auxetic fabric formed with pseudo-reentrant hexagonal structure. a) Schematic presentation of knitting process, b) fabric
at the free state, c) fabric at the stretched state, d) Poissons ratio vs. strain.

the auxetic eect of all other fabrics developed
decreases with an increase of the strain. The variation
trends of the auxetic eects calculated based on the
rigid geometrical models are opposite to those mea-
sured due to the easy geometrical shape change of knit-
ted fabrics and slippage eect taking place among the
yarns. The work again demonstrates that auxetic fab-
rics could be realized based on knitted structures and
that at knitting technology could provide a simple, but
highly eective way of fabricating auxetic fabrics from
conventional yarns. The calculated results also show
that the simple geometrical models formed with the

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1502
rigid elements are not suitable for the prediction of
auxetic eects of these complicated fabrics.
Theoretical models by taking the inuencing factors
such as loop shape deformation, yarn slippage eect
into consideration should be specically developed to
predict the auxetic eects of these knitted fabrics.
Acknowledgements
The authors greatly appreciate the valuable comments and
suggestions received from the reviewers of this paper.
Funding
This work was supported by the Research Grants Council of
Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government
(grant number PolyU5181/09E).
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