Studying bath exhaustion as a method to apply microcapsules on fabrics

Abstract

Textile industry is one of the fields that have increased their consumption of microcapsules. They can be applied to textiles using different methods, such as, padding, bath exhaustion, spraying and foaming. Although the most extended industrial application is by padding, commercial brands also suggest bath exhaustion as a possible procedure. In the research reported herein, bath exhaustion treatments are compared to padding. X-ray photoelectronic spectroscopy (XPS) technique showed that it was a suitable method to detect microcapsules’ presence on fabric surface. Results reported that high concentrations were required to obtain similar behaviours to those of padding. Moreover, we suggested reusing bath exhaustion baths, in order to minimise the loss of so much product in wastewater. We concluded that it was not possible because microcapsules deflate following contact with water for a period of time, and what is more interesting, microcapsule preparation must be done immediately before use, so as to avoid microcapsule deflation due to contact with water.

Keywords:

• bath exhaustion
• cotton
• microcapsules
• padding
• SEM
• XPS

Acknowledgement

Authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support received by this research project from the Spanish government in the programme “Plan Nacional 2008–2011” reference Mat 2009-14210-C02-01.