Information on different needle constructions and needle manufactures

The hooked metal needle is the principal knitting element of the knitting machine. Prior to yarn
feeding, the needle is raised to clear the old loop from the hook and to receive the new loop above it on
the needle stem. The new loop is then enclosed in the needle hook as the needle starts to descend. The
hook then draws the new loop down through the old loop as the latter slides over the outside of the
descending bridge of the closed hook. All needles must therefore have some method of closing the needle
hook to retain the new loop and exclude the old loop.

Until relatively recently knitting machines used four types of needle:

 The bearded needle

 The latch needle
 The compound needle

Bearded or spring needle was the first type of needle to be produced. It is the cheapest and simplest type
to manufacture as it is made from a single piece of metal, in machine gauges as fine as 60 needles per
inch. There are five main parts of the bearded needle

1. The stem
2. The head
3. The beard
4. The eye
5. The shank

The first latch needle (also known

as the tumbler needle) was patented in 1806 by Pierre Jeandeau. The latch needle was a more expensive
and intricate needle to manufacture than the bearded needle. However, the latch needle was quickly
employed by the newly emerging American knitting machine industry. It is now accepted that precision-
manufactured latch needles can knit structures of the highest quality.

The latch needle has nine main features:

1. The hook
2. The slot or saw cut
3. The cheeks or slot walls
4. The rivet
5. The latch-blade
6. The latch spoon
7. The stem
8. The butt
9. The tail

Double cylinder purl machines use a latch needle with two hooks that can knit in either the upper or lower bed.
A compound needle with a sliding latch was first patented by Jeacock of Leicester in 1856. Compound
needles consist of two separately-controlled parts – the open hook and the sliding closing element (tongue,
latch, piston, and plunger). The two parts rise and fall as a single unit but, at the top of the rise, the hook
moves faster to open the hook and at the start of the fall the hook descends faster to close the hook. It is
easier to drive the hooks and tongues collectively from two separate bars in warp knitting than to move
each hook and tongue individually, as in weft knitting.

Leading Knitting needle

manufactures

The current generation of latch and compound needles are the result of continuous engineering
development and improvement since the 1940's. They operate at very high knitting speeds, in excess of
2000 reciprocations/ minute and are capable of producing hundreds of millions of fault free stitches before
failure.
From all the manufactures involved in Knitting needle manufacturing Groz-Beckert Group played
a key role in the development and improvement of the knitting needle technology. Several other
manufactures involved in this sector are:
 Schmetz GmbH
 Componentes Textiles SA – Spain
 West Bridgford Machine Co., Ltd – UK
 Feine Handarbeitsnadeln – Germany
 Shibata Needle Manufacturing, Inc – Japan
 Needlepoint Joint - Ogden, UT, USA
 Shima Seiki- JAPAN
 Apple Needles-India

Slider needle
A slider needle for knitting machines, particularly flat knitting machines, comprises a needle body
with needle hook and at least one needle butt, and a slider equipped with slider foot and mounted to be
displaceable relative to the needle body. In order to ensure trouble-free and reliable separation of the old
stitches from newly laid yarn, a short swivel detent is mounted on the needle body behind the needle
hook. The length and shape of this swivel element is chosen so that in the normal position of the needle,
with the needle hook closed by the slider, the swivel detent is masked by the slider in the vertical
direction, while when the needle hook is open the swivel detent projects proud of the needle body and
above the slider in both its end positions.
 The invention relates to a device on a knitting machine equipped with slider needles for
controlling the laying in of a thread into the open needle hooks. In order to avoid that the thread is not laid
into the hooks correctly or that a thread which has already been laid into the hook, jumps out of the hook
during the closing movement of the slider parts on account of vibrations or the like, the slider parts of the
slider needles are provided with inclined faces which project when the hooks are closed into the thread
spaces formed by these hooks and the needle and slider parts. In this way the thread portions between the
thread guide and the slider needles are pressed deeply into the thread spaces during the closing movement
of the slider parts, so that the thread sections laid into the following slider needles with hooks still open
come securely into the respective thread spaces or are retained there.

Common feeder densities of circular weft knitting machines and the diameter of
machines
There are three classes of weft knitting machines.

 Straight bar frame machines

 Flat machines
 Circular machines

Among these machines, circular weft knitting machines are widely used for mass production purposes.
Here are some important details about some circular knitting machine types.

 Single Jersey Circular Knitting Machine Diameter: 30"-34"

Feeder density: 42F-48F 
 Single Circular Knitting Machine (SM-SK) Diameter: 16"-40"
Feeder: 48F-120F
 Double Circular Knitting Machine Diameter: 15"-38"
Feeder densities: 2.5F\2.1F\1.8F
Cam Configuration: Dial 2. cylinder 4
 Double Circular Knitting Machine(BYD) Diameter: 30"-38"
Feeder: 72F/84F/96F
 Open Width Circular Knitting Machine Diameter:30"-38"
Feeder:3F
 High Precision Single Jersey Circular Diameter: 12"-44"
Knitting Machine Number of feeders: 36F-132F
 High-Speed Single Jersey Knitting Cylinder diameter: 26''-34''
Machinery Feeder: 104-136F
 Seamless Underwear Knitting Machine Diameters: 13''-16''
(NM207-CQS) Feeder density: 8F

Popular Gauges of Circular Knitting Machines and their Speeds

 Machine gauge, simply it can be defined as number of needles per inch which denotes by E or GG.
For an instant, In Sri Lanka 38E (or 38GG) gauge is widely used. Usually all primary elements in the
same machine are set to the same gauge. Machine gauge of a particular machine is mainly depend on the
what yarn is used and it’s count. As well as the properties of fabric are affected by the gauge of the
machine such as appearance, weight, especially tightness of the fabric. Not only that those all should be
adjusted according to the end product.

The knitting industry as a whole can be divided into four manufacturing sectors, these are: Fully
Fashioned, flat knitting, circular knitting and warp knitting. Single needle bed machines and Double or
two needle bed machines are popular circular weft knitting machine which are divided according to
whether they were knitted with one or two sets of needles.

Single Needle Bed Machine

Single needle bed machines are equipped with a single “cylinder”, about 30
inch diameter, of needles that produce plain fabrics. Have higher running
speed, more feeders and knit a great range of structure compared with double
needle bed machines.

Popular gauges high speed knitting machines

22G, 24G

1. RT-SJOW (RT-SJOW3, RT-SJOW4, Mayer & Cie)

Gauge range18G-28G, Diameter range 30"- 40" Speed 23 rpm -34 rpm
2. RT-6SJA (6 track, Mayer & Cie)
3. RT-SJAS (Auto Stripper (4-6) Colors, Mayer & Cie)
4. RT-SJPP (Single Loop Pile With Reverse Plating Single Terry Circular Knitting Machine)

18G, 20G

1. GLF/2.8F (20 – 36 rpm, Goang Lih Machinery)

Tie-In yarn and Backing yarn for weaving the fish-scale cloths. This is the best material for making
sports wear, overcoat and leisure suits.
2. GLF/S (3F4T) (18 – 36 rpm, Goang Lih Machinery)
4 Track Single Jersey Machine, highly economical Knitting Machine, This machine can knit 3-lines
fleece fabric like lady's dress, sport wear, blanket and baby dress etc.
3. High speed single jersey by Vanguard Pai Lung (22 gauge, 24 inch diameter)
4. RT-FSJA (45 rpm)
Fleece Circular Knitting Machine
5. Youfeng Rel Tex – YFSG (Diameter 12"-44")

28G

1. GLS 34” (15 – 20 rpm, Goang Lih Machinery)

2. Sell Single Jersey (24 rpm, Quanzhou Luojiang Youfeng Machinery Co., Ltd)
Double Needle Bed Machine

Double needle bed machines are single jersey machines with a “dial”
which consist set of needles positioned horizontally adjacent to the
vertical cylinder needles. 18 gauge with 30 inch diameter machines are
widely used successfully. Typical examples include interlock based
structures for underwear/base layer garments and 1 x 1 rib fabrics for
leggings and outerwear products

1. RT-DJA (Four track, 30-40 rpm)

Typically use knitting interlock, 1 x 1 rib, 2 x 2 rib interlock eight lock, Milano rib, single pique.

Diameter 30" 32" 34" 36" 38" 40"

No. of Feeds RT-8DJ 84 90 96 100 106 112
RT-8DJA 62 68 72 76 80 84
Gauge (N.P.I.) 16G~28G
2. RT-DJOW

Diameter 30"~40"
Feeder 2, 2.12, 2.4, 2.8 Feeds / Inch
Gauge 14G~28G.

3. GLI-D2C2 (Dial 2 Track, Cylinder 2 Tracks, 15-36 rpm Goang Lih Machinery)
4. GLI-D2D4 (Dial 2 Track, Cylinder 4 Tracks, Goang Lih Machinery)
GLI series can knit plain fabric, pique fabric, sport cloth and leisure suit etc. Also using the spandex to
knit the spandex elastically fabric.

Different types of cams available and their functions

Cams are the devices which convert the rotary machine drive into a suitable reciprocating
action for the needles and other elements. The knitting cams act directly onto the butts of needles or other
elements to produce individual or serial movement in the tricks of a needle.
Two arrangements exist:
a) Revolving cylinder machines – the needle butts pass through the stationary cam system and the
fabric hanging from the needles revolves with them.
b) Reciprocating cam - carriage flat machines or rotating cam-box circular machines – the cams with
the yarn feeds pass across the stationary needle beds.
At each yarn feed position there is a set of cams consisting of at least a raising cam, a stitch
cam and an upthrow cam, whose combined effect is to cause a needle to carry out a knitting cycle if
required. On circular machines there is a removable cam section or door so that knitting elements can be
replaced.
The raising cam causes the needles to be lifted to tuck, clearing, loop transfer and needle
transfer height, depending upon machine design. The swing cam is pivoted so that the butts will be
unaffected when it is out of the track and it may also be swung into the track to raise the butts.The bolt
cam can be caused to descend into the cam track to control the element butts or be withdrawn out of
action so that the butts pass undisturbed across its face; it is mostly used on garment-length machines to
produce changes of rib set-outs. The stitch cam controls the depth to which the needle descends, thus
controlling the amount of yarn drawn into the needle loop; it also functions simultaneously as a knock-
over cam. The upthrow or counter cam takes the needles back to the rest position and allows the newly-
formed loops to relax. The stitch cam is normally adjustable for different loop lengths and it may be
attached to a slide together with the upthrow cam, so that the two are adjusted in unison. In there is no
separate upthrow cam; section X of the raising cam is acting as the upthrow cam. The guard cams are
often placed on the opposite side of the cam-race to limit the movement of the butts and to prevent
needles from falling out of track. Separate cam-boxes are required for each needle bed or associated
element bed and they must be linked together or coordinated. If the cam-box itself is moving from right-
to-left, the needle butts will pass through in a left-to-right direction. On circular fabric machines, the cams
are designed to act in only one direction, but on flat and circular leg-wear machines, the cams are
symmetrically arranged to act in both directions of cam-box traverse, with only the leading edges of
certain cams in action. All cam systems are a compromise between speed variety, needle control and
selection systems.
Following figure shows the arrangement between the needle and sinker cams as the elements pass
through in a left to right direction with the letters indicating the positions of the elements at the various
points in the knitting cycle.
The needle cam race consists of the following:
The clearing cam (1) and its guard cam
(4), the stitch cam (2) and upthrow cam (3) which
are vertically adjustable together for alteration of
stitch length, and the return cam (5) and its guard
cam (6).
The three sections of the sinker cam race
are the race cam (7), the sinker withdrawing cam
(8) and the sinker-return cam (9) which is
adjustable in accordance with the stitch length.

Needle cam system