The purpose of this study was to
develop a warm-up suit that is comfortable as well
as having a good thermal performance. Heat-insulating
water vapor-permeable fabrics for warm-up
suit were developed by applying ceramic powders
to hydrophilic polyurethane films, which were
then incorporated into textiles. Two types of
ceramic compounds were used in this study: MU-
4N and RT-3. The infrared emissivity was 92.6 for
MU-4N and 94.8 for RT-3. In order to evaluate
the effectiveness of using ceramics in a warm-up
suit, we examined the effects of ceramics on
selected variables: thermo-physiological properties
of the clothing systems (using thermal manikin),
and thermo-physiological responses and subjective
sensations of human subjects. The infrared
emissivity of textiles increased when ceramics
were added to the film laminate. Ceramics
slightly increased the thermal insulation value
and decreased the water vapor transmission rate.
The thermal manikin test also showed that ceramics
enhanced the thermal insulation of the clothing system
without increasing the evaporative resistance.
The microclimate temperature was kept higher
when subjects wore the warm-up suit with ceramics.