Effects of Various Home Laundering Practices on the Dimensional Stability Wrinkling, and Other Properties of Plain Woven Cotton Fabrics Part I: Experimental Overview, Reproducibility of Results, and Effect of Detergent

As part of an ongoing research program on the effects of laundering on plain woven cotton fabrics, specimens of poplin and sheeting fabrics with and without a DMDHEU wrinkle resistant finish are laundered under regimes designed to evaluate the effect of five common home laundering variables: use of detergent, rinse cycle softener, or tumble sheet softener, different drying methods, and different tumble drying times. To reduce the cost and time involved in this and future investigations, the reproducibility of results from repeated but otherwise identical wash loads is also evaluated. Length and width shrinkage, skewness, wrinkling, mass of whole specimen, area density, and warp and weft yarn diameters are determined using the appropriate standard test methods. The effects of fabric structure and application of an anti-wrinkle finish on the dependent variables are also studied.