Patent ID: 7272957

Claim:
A method of knitting pile fabric by a weft knitting machine including a compound needle whose slider is capable of advancing farther to a needle bed gap than a hook of a needle body, the compound needle being provided on at least one of opposed front and rear needle beds between which the needle bed gap lies, the method comprising: feeding a fastening yarn and a pile yarn to a knitting needle on a needle bed, opposed to a needle bed provided with the compound needle across the needle bed gap, the feeding including, setting, when the pile yarn is fed to the knitting needle, the pile yarn also on a tongue of a slider of the compound needle, not feeding, when fastening yarn is fed to the knitting needle, the fastening yarn to the compound needle, forming stitches of the pile yarn and the fastening yarn so that only a pile stitch is held on the tongue of the slider of the compound needle, and forming a pile loop in a fabric being knitted by the knitting needle by retracting the slider of the compound needle from the needle bed gap and releasing the pile stitch from the tongue of the slider.