Oxidative bleaching of woolen fabrics

The aim of this paper was to bleach woolen fabrics for whiteness improvement with low fabric damage. Bleaching was carried out with various oxidizing agents based on peroxide, perborate, percarbonate and peroxyacetic acid. Due to a protein nature of selected fabrics, it was necessary to investigate the conditions of bleaching in slightly alkaline and acidic medium applying tetra acetyl ethylene diamine (TAED) as activator. The evaluation of bleaching effectiveness was performed by whiteness degree, yellowness index, breaking force and elongation, and fabric hand. Additionally, surface characterization of fabrics was performed by scanning electron microscopy analysis. It was shown that bleach based on perborate provided a proper whiteness, strength, where a good hand was preserved as well.