Warp knitting machine

Claim 1

A warp knitting machine employing insert threads and warp inlay threads and having a bed of needles and a magazine for weft threads, comprising: a pair of endless transfer means each having weft thread holding means, spaced with a predetermined spacing, for retaining said weft threads in parallel and delivering them to said needle bed in a predetermined direction; a weft thread sled means having a plurality of thread guides for reciprocating between said pair of transfer means to insert said weft threads in mutually and diagonally crossing layers, each of said layers having a mutually opposed orientation to stitch wales produced by said needles, said layers running alternately between the weft thread holding means of each of said transfer means, said thread guides being greater in number than said needles, said thread guides being operable when reversing direction to lay each of said weft threads around only one weft thread holding means at that time, said weft thread sled means being operable to move transversely to said predetermined delivery direction at a reciprocating speed to lay the weft threads of at least one of the thread guides proximal to said needle bed in a position, next to and displaced by one transfer means division from, at least one of the weft threads laid by at least one of the thread guides distal to the needle bed in an earlier cycle; weft thread insert means for providing said insert threads in a layer and perpendicular to said predetermined delivery direction; and at least one warp inlay means for providing across the width of the needle bed and from the warp inlay threads, at least one thread layer inserted downstream from the outermost one of said weft thread insert means and said weft thread sled means, to be carried by said transfer means.