Energy Absorption and Performance Relevant to Thermal Wear Comfort Evaluation of Existing Impact Protective Pad and Materials Intended for Impact Protective Pad

Abstract

This paper reported an evaluation of the absorption energy and performance relevant to thermal wear comfort of existing hip protective pad and materials intended for use in hip protective pad. For energy absorption evaluation the experimental pads were compressed using Instron Tester, while dry thermal resistance and evaporative resistance of experimental pads were tested using sweating guarded hot plate. The stress-strain compression curves from the experimental results were used to analyze the absorption energy of the pads. It was determined that knitted spacer fabric had better relative energy absorption than closed cell foams, and better absolute energy absorption when treated with shear-thickening fluid. Also, the dead mass of spacer fabrics is the lower than the one of foams. Physical form and morphology of knitted spacer fabric allowed easier thermal and vapour transfer to the environment in comparison to those of closed-cell foam, where knitted spacer fabric had both lower dry thermal resistance and evaporative resistance values than closed cell foam which makes the knitted spacer fabric suitable for protective pads used in high sport activity and hot environmental environments. This study concluded that knitted spacer fabric could successfully be used as alternative material for impact protective pad.