A study of tubular braided structure with negative Poisson’s ratio behavior

Textile structures with negative Poisson’s ratio (PR) behavior are called auxetic textile structures. They have received increasing attention in recent years and have been designed and fabricated through spinning, knitting, weaving and non-woven methods. However, auxetic textile structures fabricated using braiding method have not been reported so far. This paper reported a novel type of auxetic braided structure based on a helical structural arrangement. The geometry of the structure and its deformation mechanism were first introduced and described. Then a special manufacturing process was developed by the modification of commonly used tubular braiding technology. Various auxetic braids were fabricated with different structural parameters and yarns and tested under uniaxial extension conditions. The results showed that all manufactured braids exhibited high negative PR behavior and maintained this behavior until the fracture of the component wrap yarn. Among three structural parameters discussed, namely wrap angle, braiding angle and braiding yarn diameter, the wrap angle had more effects on the tensile properties of auxetic braided structure than the other two parameters. The success of fabricating auxetic braids with commercially available yarns in this study provides an alternative way to manufacture auxetics from positive PR materials.