Abstract: Sheer hosiery (200) is provided that maintains the appearance of conventional sheer hosiery while eliminating the foot discomfort that is typically encountered when wearing conventional sheer hosiery. Embodiments of the sheer hosiery (200) include a sheer leg portion (260) and a foot portion (210) that is affixed to the sheer leg portion (260) and at least partially made of a comfort fabric. The foot portion (210) contacts one or more portions of a wearer's foot, such as, for example, a ball portion and a toe portion, and is hidden from view when the wearer's foot is inserted in footwear. The foot portion (210) may be somewhat thicker than the sheer leg portion (260) but is not so thick as to interfere with the fit of the footwear.

Abstract: The present unitary needle selection device is operable to selectively position the knitting needles of a circular knitting machine in either knit, tuck or welt positions. The needle selection device includes a pair of side-by-side stacks of selector slides or cams supported for individual horizontal sliding movement between innermost active and outermost inactive radial positions. The inner ends of the selector slides are aligned with selector butts of selector jacks and a pattern drum is supported for indexable rotation adjacent the outer ends of the selector slides. Pairs of vertically aligned rows of pattern combs are supported in spaced-apart relationship on the pattern drum and the pattern butts are vertically aligned and movable into engagement with the outer ends of the corresponding side-by-side stacks of selector slides.

Abstract: During at least one complete rotation of the needle cylinder of a circular knitting machine, more than one yarn-carrying finger is kept activated at at least one of the machine's striping boxes. Each striping box includes an indexed control drum having axial slots which receive finger-activating jacks. An annular holding spring extends circumferentially of the control drum midway between the drum's axial ends and very tightly holds the axial legs of L-shaped jacks. To simultaneously activate yarn fingers located at opposite axial sides of the holding spring, at least one axial holding slot contains two L-shaped jacks. The axial legs of the two jacks are held in conventional manner beneath the spring, but are each of half-normal thickness, so that their combined thickness equals that of the holding slot for a snug fit therein.

Abstract: Mechanism for selecting and controlling needles of circular knitting machine wherein, at each feed of the knitting machine, there is provided a cam path in which is engageable an outwardly projecting butt on an axially reciprocable needle to reciprocate the needle. An activating swing jack is pivoted to the bottom of the needles and a selector jack is pivoted to the unit and is operatively associated with the activating swing jack. A selector butt and a complementary eraser butt on the selector jack are respectively positively engaged by a selector lever and an eraser lever, the selector lever moving the jacks and hence the needles whereby the needle butts engage in the cam path while the eraser lever move the jacks and hence the needles, whereby the needle butts are disengaged from the cam path, respectively to bring the needle into its operative and inoperative condition. The selector and eraser levers cooperate with the selector and eraser butts of the selector jack over the entire length of the feed.