ultralight lame -- name of the material

[george100]

I could use some help to identify the technical name of the material used to make the ultraligh lame's, that have no metalic thread.
I'm also interested to find you which company is producing this material.

thanks
George100

[keropie]

this would be MUCH better in the armory...

[passata_sotto]

TCA produces the ultralight lamé with no wires. Triplette sells it in the States.

[Craig]

There are a few of the non-metallic lames out there. They are produced by Triplette (USA), Leon Paul (UK) and FWF (FenceWithFun)(GER). All are available for sale in the USA.

Craig

[KD5MDK]

They might also have meant the Infinity Lames many people have.

[george100]

Sorry, what TCA stands for ?

Thanks,
George100

[oiuyt]

TCA == Triplette Competition Arms

All of the responses here seem to indicate vendors from which to purchase the lamés. The OP was asking for material sourcing (presumably to MAKE lamés?).

-B

[fencerbill]

I haven't had a chance to look at the conductive T-shirts now used for reel-less Sabre for a couple of years. The ones I saw about 4 years ago used the same material TCA used for the behind the shoulder inserts for some of their Sabre Lames at that time.

What is being used for reel-less Sabre now? I doubt if it is stainless Lame, that would be pretty scratchy.

[KD5MDK]

I think the point is none of the manufacturers have indicated where their source of material is, so nobody knows.

[oiuyt]

Some guesses previously made on f.net (or derived from guesses made here previously) include:

http://www.marktek-inc.com/ (source of Infinity's material per Dave Neevel)*
http://www.lessemf.com/fabric.html
http://www.lairdtech.com/pages/produ...tiveFabric.asp

* also from the Marktek website (emphasis added)

Originally Posted by Marktek

Silver and Nickel/Silver Metallized Fabrics - High quality, durable, metal-coated woven, knit, mesh, and non-woven fabrics, and hook & loop materials for EMI shielding applications in numerous forms such as EMI gaskets, tape, cable wrap, enclosures, and architectural shielding; also, lightweight, flexible, and/or porous reflective planes, fencing vests, and electrodes for skin. Surface resistivities are all less than 0.2 ohm/sq, and the fabrics possess superior metal adhesion and corrosion and abrasion resistance, properties so important for EMI gaskets and tapes. Flame-Resistant (FR) versions of some of these fabrics are also available.

Other threads on the topic:
Lame material part 2
Lame cloth menufacturer

-B

[george100]

Thank you. This is good information
George100

[yeoldearmourer]

www.lessemf.com sell conductive fabric they have a nice double knit fabric at 100.00 a yard it takes about 2 yards of it to make a sabre lame. We are think about making one for Adelia. The other fbric they sell would be hard to work with.

[rcmatthews]

Is that fabric much better than what you would get by buying a lame? Or do you just want to make it so that it has a custom fit?

[fencerbill]

Originally Posted by yeoldearmourer

www.lessemf.com sell conductive fabric they have a nice double knit fabric at 100.00 a yard it takes about 2 yards of it to make a sabre lame. We are think about making one for Adelia. The other fbric they sell would be hard to work with.

How wide? To rebuild Sabre masks I get material that is 58 inches wide. At that width you should make 3 or 4 Sabre Lames from 2 yards. And Adelia takes a smaller size than a lot of people. The problem with making Lames yourself is the pattern.

[yeoldearmourer]

The pattern is not a problem Bill since Janet has made patterns and have several course in design work which includes making patterns all the time. The width is 52 inch they only sell it by the yard and we have extra to do her bib. If it wasn"t for the rules we could make a pull over lame with this material. Because of my size Janet makes patterns for me were I can make shirts for me that fit.

[oiuyt]

Originally Posted by yeoldearmourer

If it wasn"t for the rules we could make a pull over lame with this material.

Which rule(s) are you thinking of here?

Separate question(s):
* Which material from them do you use?
* Is it similar/identical to the material used by any specific brand of fencing lamé, and, if so, which one(s)?

On the site it looks like all of their fabrics are sold by linear foot rather than yard. Mostly 54" wide.

-B

[yeoldearmourer]

Rule M.28 explain how it is to be tested which a pull over doesn't meet see firque 15. two Strectch Conductive Fabric is the best of all of the fabric they sell which is 52" wide. The other fabric is to thin or won't past ohms because the fabric is to wide to conductive. Janet convert it from liner foot to how much it would be to yards. i got a sample pack of the fabric from them and tested it. The fabric is not like other lames I have seen. I would know how long it would last or how easy it would tear.

[MTD]

Originally Posted by yeoldearmourer

Rule M.28 explain how it is to be tested which a pull over doesn't meet...

I can't find where the rules would prohibit a pull-over either. There's discussion of how it must be found to be shaped if laid flat, but it never says that it has to open up anyplace in particular to achieve laying it flat -- or even that it has to open up at all, just as long as it can be laid flat to verify the shape. Lamés are almost always inspected closed, rather than opened, and whether it can be opened has no effect on the inspection which actually is performed.

Citing figure 15 seems irrelevant. For figure 15 to be satisfied literally, a saber lamé must have its closure exactly in the middle of the back. I prefer to consider figure 15 a map of an "unwrapped" lamé, the same way that we've been looking at "unwrapped" world maps all our lives without discussing the east and the west edges of the world. Figure 15 is also rather abstract, rather than literal, in most respects. If you actually manufacture a garment from the pattern of Figure 15, I think the fencer it fits would need the immediate services of an orthopedic surgeon, if not a mortician. At first glance, it isn't too bad, with the fencer having a cylindrical torso with the arms connected to the sides with no shoulders, but then note that the arms are farther from the front line than the back of the neck. For the fabric to match the fencer, he has to have a projection along his spine akin to a stegosaurus plate, to which his arms are connected!

There is mention in m.28 that the conductive thread must be in both the warp and the weft, which would seem to imply, literally, that the material must be woven, since these are terms which apply to woven fabric and not knit fabric. One could engage in semantic games over whether a knit achieves the spirit of the rule. One can say the spirit of the rule requires conductors to go in two perpendicular directions. Knits do have the conductor of each row go in one direction (albeit with one S-curve per stitch) and no conductors going in the perpendicular direction. Or, one could say that the thread travels in that perpendicular direction too, twice in each stitch.

Anyway, knit versus woven has nothing to do with whether the rules prohibit a pull-over.

If the rules really do prohibit a pull-over, does that mean my lamé ceases to be conforming if the zipper jams and can never be fully unzipped (but can still be fully zipped to close properly around the neck)??

[george100]

I received samples from the two companies bellow:
http://www.marktek-inc.com/ (source of Infinity's material per Dave Neevel)*
http://www.lessemf.com/fabric.html

Unfortunatelly the quality is poor. The metallized fabric is not dense enough and is loosing its shape when is stretched a bit.

Does anybody know any other supplier of metallized fabrics for making lame?

[Robert Smith]

Originally Posted by oiuyt

Some guesses previously made on f.net (or derived from guesses made here previously) include:

http://www.marktek-inc.com/ (source of Infinity's material per Dave Neevel)*
http://www.lessemf.com/fabric.html
http://www.lairdtech.com/pages/produ...tiveFabric.asp

I can verify the Marktek source; I've bought material from them and we've made foil lames out of it. They actually get it from Swift Textile Metallizing, who don't have a web site and I guess don't do retail. From Marktek, in consumer quantities - we bought 10 yards, I think - it cost around $50 per yard. Takes around 1.5 yards to make a foil lame, as it's quite narrow fabric - only around a yard wide. Making a foil lame took $75 of fabric, maybe $20 or so of other parts - lining, D-ring, elastic, bias edging - and, after some practice, two to three hours cutting and sewing, once we had some patterns to work from. Would I do it again? No, I'd go buy cheap JLs and apply conductive thread once they started to fail.

Reason I went looking for fabric in the first place was because I could get no response from Mr Infinity; I had a dead spot of a square inch or so, by the time I'd managed to wheedle, coax and sabre-rattle a three-inch square patch out of him, I had a mostly dead front panel. Infinity's a bit of an exaggeration. I'm still using that same lame four years later, but now it's criss-crossed with a fine grid of conductive thread.

I'd be interested to know which of lessemf's fabrics are useable, though, if anyone's actually used them. I've been through their web site a number of times, looking for alternatives to MarkTek's fabrics, and there's always been some down side - either high resistance, lack of robustness, lack of flexibility, toxicity or whatever. Most of their products seem to be aimed more at static dissipation than useful current carrying (e.g. their thread, resistance <1000K Ohm/10cm)