The effects of ramie blended car seat covers on thermal comfort during road trials

The main objective of this study was to investigate the thermal comfort effects of ramie blended seat cover (RBSC) material on drivers. In the experiment, polyester seat covers (PSC) were compared to RBSCs. Both quantitative (measured) and qualitative (perceived) thermal comfort data were collected under normal traffic conditions. Ten volunteer subjects (seven males and three females) who had at least 5 years driving experience and were between 30 and 35 years of age were selected to participate in the study. During trials, temperature was measured at four points that have direct contact between the driver and the seat. Skin wettedness was measured at the back of the subject's torso. During the trials, subjects provided qualitative data by responding to a five question survey administered at 5 min intervals. A significance level of 0.001 inferred that subjects preferred RBSC over PSC seat covers. Relevance to industry: This study demonstrates the effects of ramie blended seat cover material (RBSC) and real traffic conditions in thermal comfort. Industries can use our findings to evaluate their ergonomic seat comfort in vehicles and the results of this study can be applied to related industrial applications. (c) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.