King Charlie not prepared to carry key climbing gear (8)
I believe the answer is:
knitwear
'gear' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both man-made objects as well as being singular nouns.
Perhaps there's an association between them I don't understand?
'king charlie not prepared to carry key climbing' is the wordplay.
'king charlie' becomes 'knit' (I can't justify this - if you can you should believe this answer much more).
'not prepared' becomes 'raw' (as in raw food).
'to carry' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'key' becomes 'e' (musical key).
'climbing' says the letters should be written backwards (in a down clue, letters climb up).
'raw' placed around 'e' is 'raew'.
'raew' reversed gives 'wear'.
'knit'+'wear'='KNITWEAR'
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for knitwear that I've seen before include "that often covers blouses etc" , "Clothing of intertwined wool" , "Jersey etc ..." , "warm clothing" , "Woollen goods" .)