Determination of Electrical Resistance for Conductive Textiles Under Simulated Wearing Environment Using Modified Sweating Guarded Hotplate

Abstract

E-textile system made of conductive fabric directly contacts with human skin so that electrical resistance of conductive fabric is interactive with microclimate between human skin and the fabric. In order to simulate the microclimate using sweating guarded-hotplate, a device was designed to keep the fabric and hotplate separate from each other. This device includes a sensor to measure the temperature and relative humidity. The microclimate is determined by measuring the water-vapour resistance to the air layer (R_{et_al}), the relative humidity (RH) and temperature between the hotplate and the fabric. For the measurement of electrical resistance, four electrode-four wire method was set up on the device using the measurement principle of Kelvin method with a DC current source. The electrical resistance of conductive fabric was measured under simulated microclimate using the new combined test method.