Oxidative Clearing of Polyester Cotton Blended Fabric by Hydrogen Peroxide: An Alternative to Reduction Clearing

Reduction clearing is commonly carried out as an after-treatment to remove deposits of disperse dye and other residual impurities from the surface of dyed polyester. Because of certain environmental and economical disadvantages associated with traditional reduction clearing, there is industrial interest in alternative processes. In this study the P/C blended fabric was dyed with disperse dyes in grey state and then treated with H2O2 at different concentration for oxidation clearing. Another process was carried out conventionally where pre-treated P/C blended fabric was dyed with disperse dyes and reduction cleared. Fabrics from both processes were dyed with reactive dyes. The performance was evaluated through assessing the changes in absorbency, Kubelka-monk theory (K/S value), wash fastness, rubbing fastness, bursting strength test and by comparing the obtained results. The overall results showed that, the test results of oxidation clearing process were quite similar to reduction clearing process. But after reactive dyeing oxidation cleared samples showed better results than reduction cleared samples.