Basic elements of knitting

There are three basic elements of knitting,such as

1. Needle
2. Cam
3.Sinker

The Needles:
The needles are most important stitch forming elements.They are displayed vertically up and
down and are mounted into tricks or cuts of knitting cylinder.
There are three types of needles namely:

 Latch needle
 Spring-bearded needle
 Compound needle

 Latch needle: It consists of a hook portion at the top and a latch riverted at certain
distance from the needle head. Latch needles are given sliding movements in
individual grooves called tricks of cylinder.The latch swing freely and the stem is a
straight portion with a protruding butt.The latch needles are self acting,and
requires only previous loop on the stem and do not require any outside agency to
close hook.

 Spring-Bearded Needle: This needle consist of a top hook curved downwards with a
finished tip and the downward continuation is called beard. A small eye groove is cut
in the stem, to recieve the point of the needle beard when it is closed. It does’nt
require latch, it is finer in cross section and more number of needles per unit space
can be and hence finer machine gauge can be achieved. It requires additional element
to close the needle which is done by a presser.The bearded needle produces superior
knitted stitches than the latch needle.

 Compound needle: The compound needles are used in weft and warp knitting
machines. In contrast to standard spring-bearded needles and latch needles the
compound needles consists of two separate parts- the stem & the sliding latch. At the
top of the compound needle stem there is a hook. The two parts rise and fall as a
single unit but at the top of the rise the hook moves faster to open and at the start of
the fall the hook descends faster to close the hook. The compound needle stem can be
made of a U- shaped steel wire or of a steel tube. The sliding latch is made of a steel
wire.

The Cams
Cam is the second primary knitting element. The cams are the mechanical devices which convert
the rotary machine drive into a suitable reciprocating action for the needles or other elements.
 There are two types of cams:

 Engineering cams
 Knitting cams

 Engineering Cam : It is circular cam. This circular engineering cams indirectly control the
motion of bars of elements which move en masse as a single units in cottons patent to and warp
knitting machine. They are attached to a rotary drive shaft situated parallel to and below the
needle bar.
In warp knitting machines, four types of cam drive have been worked:

 Single acting cams

 Cam & counter cams
 Box cams
 Contour cams

 Knitting Cam : The angular knitting cam acts directly on the butts of needles or other elements to
produce individual or seriatim movement in the tricks of latch needle weft knitting machines as
the butts pass through the stationary cam system or the cams pass across the stationary tricks.
There are three groups of knitting cam:

 Knit Cam
 Tuck Cam
 Miss Cam

The main parts of a knitting cams are-

 The Raising cam
 The Stitch cam
 The up throw cam
 The guard cam

The Sinkers:
The sinker is the third primary knitting element. It is a thin metal plate.

The functions of sinker are given below:

 Loop formation
 Holding-down
 Knocking-over
According to these functions the sinkers are also divided into three groups-
 Loop forming sinker
 Holding-down sinker
 Knocking over sinker
 The first function of sinker is loop formation. The main purpose of sinker is to sink or
kink the newly laid yarn into a loop as its forward edge or catch advances between the
two adjoining needles.

A second and more common function of sinkers on modern machines is to hold down the
old loops at a lower level on the needle stems than the new loops which are being formed
& prevent the old loops from being lifted as the needles rise to clear them from their
hooks.

The third function of the sinker – as a knock-over surface-where its upper surface or belly
supports the old loop as the new loop is drawn through it.

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