Abstract: In order to study the suitable materials for 3D printed clothing, the cross section morphology,molecular structure, thermal properties, tensile properties and resilience of flexible PLA materials before and after melt spinning in 3D printers were tested and analyzed. The results show that the internal molecular structure of the flexible PLA before and after the high temperature melt spinning has not changed. The glass transition temperature of the flexible PLA is 65 ℃ and the melting point is 165.57 ℃. The tensile strength of the flexible PLA filaments with diameter 0.4 mm is 461.9 cN. The elongation at break is 691.67% and the elastic recovery at constant elongation is 68.37%. The elastic recovery at constant load is 68.69%. It shows that the PLA filaments have good stretch and resilience and the flexible PLA is suitable for the study of 3D printed clothing materials.

Key words: 3D printed clothing; flexible PLA materials; FDM technology; performance characterization