Cleaner production of inkjet printed cotton fabrics using a urea-free ecosteam process

Abstract

We report the development of a cleaner process of producing inkjet printed cotton fabrics with improved color strength, absorbed dye fixation, ink penetration and colorfastness. Inkjet printing of cotton is typically done in the dry state and requires long durations (40–60 min), use of hazardous chemicals and considerable amounts of urea. In this research, ecosteam process has been developed that can print cotton in the wet state in a short time without using urea resulting in better quality, lower costs and lesser harm to the environment. The effect of ecosteam process conditions on the color strength (K/S value), absorbed dye fixation, whiteness index, ink penetration of printed cotton, colorfastness to laundering and crocking were studied. The drying behavior of the wet cotton in ecosteam process was also investigated. An ecosteam process at a temperature of 120 °C for 10 min with relative humidity of 80% was proved to be efficient for imparting reactive print fixation to cotton fabric. The new method of printing improves the K/S value, dye fixation, ink penetration and colorfastness of printed cotton by about 2.44%, 15.79%, 493.47% and 25%, respectively compared to conventional process. Ecosteam process is a cleaner method that can eliminate the use of urea from inkjet printing process. In addition, ecosteam process does not require twice drying after pre-treatment and twice washing after steaming, resulting in higher production efficiency and lower energy consumption.