Clothing and the enclosed air layers highly affect heat dissipation from the body and thus, are crucial factors when it comes to thermal comfort. The heat and moisture transfer is affected by the variation of the size and the shape of air gaps between the garment and the human body. In addition, the fabric and garment design properties can affect the amount of heat loss from different body parts. In this study, we investigated the effect of fabric properties (different raw materials and weave types) and the garment fit on the heat loss through the garment combinations (undershirt and shirt) for the different parts of the upper body (trunk, chest, and back) using a sweating thermal manikin. The undershirt fit and the raw material of the shirts showed strong effects on the dry thermal resistance of the garment combinations. Moreover, the undershirt properties affected the evaporative heat loss from garment combinations, and the magnitude of these effects varied over different body regions. Whilst the undershirt fit had a significant impact on the evaporative heat loss of the back region, the influence of the undershirt raw material was more important in the chest region. The findings of this study provide fundamental knowledge to improve the thermal comfort of garment combinations for office wear.
In this study, the heat transfer and moisture management properties of fabric combinations for office wear consisting of underwear and shirt fabrics, including three different fiber types and three kinds of weave types, were investigated. A sweating torso methodology was applied in order to characterize fabric combinations in terms of thermophysiological comfort for office occupants. This study showed that the cooling effect due to perspiration, accumulated moisture, and drying time of the combinations with cotton underwear were unaffected by both weave type and fiber type of shirt layer. However, initial cooling and drying time values of the combinations with underwear consisting of hydrophobic fibers were affected statistically significant by the fiber of the shirt layer. The percentage of moisture accumulation in the fabric layers was directly related to the fiber type of the underwear fabrics. Based on an extended data analysis, it was concluded that the combination of polyester underwear and cotton polyester twill shirt fabrics was the most recommendable of all the combinations used in this study with regard to the thermophysiological comfort of office occupants.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.