A Novel Low Temperature Approach for Simultaneous Scouring and Bleaching of Knitted Cotton Fabric at 60 °C

Abstract

Exceedingly high temperatures (normally ∼98 °C) are used to perform hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) bleaching of cotton fabrics in textile industrial practice. Such harsh conditions lead to high energy consumptions and high fabric mass loss. In recent years, the industry and academic communities have conducted extensive research to reduce the temperature for industrial cotton bleaching. In this research, we developed a new H2O2 activator based on amino nitriles. All of the data demonstrated that in the presence of the new H2O2 activator, the combined scouring/bleaching of the knitted cotton fabric could be performed at 60 °C. The cotton knit fabric treated using the low temperature procedure also has lower fabric weight loss; some of the hydrophobic substances were retained on the fiber surface after the process. We found that the residual hydrophobic substances had little effect on the whiteness of the treated fabrics after application of optical brighteners, and had little effect on the shade-depth and colorfa...