A perforated drum drier with a first lower inlet opening in a rear wall of a drier housing for feeding a tubular knit fabric to a first drum in the housing, and with a substantially horizontal stentering chain mechanism extending through a second upper inlet opening into the housing to a front guide roller for the two pin-studded stentering chains, the axis of which is located slightly ahead of a vertical plane extending through the axis of the first drum, and so far above the first drum that the parts of the lower stringers of the chains adjacent to the front guide roller are substantially in horizontal alignment with the top of the first drum so that an open fabric will be removed from the pins of the chains by its own gravity and by the suction of the first drum and be transferred simultaneously to this drum. The stentering mechanism is located so highly from the floor that an operator can stand underneath it.