Construction of a Carbon Fiber Reinforced Weft Guide Bar for a Crochet Knitting Machine

The crochet knitting machine is a warp knitting machine with a weft insertion system placed on a weft guide bar. On standard machines, the weft guide bar is made from aluminum and weighs about 570 g. The single-drive motors, which power the bar, account for 15–20% of the machines total power consumption. The aim of this research was to reduce power consumption by decreasing the mass of the weft guide bar. This was done by constructing the bar from carbon fiber reinforced plastics rather than aluminum, resulting in a mass saving of 260 g.