Polyacrylate Ester-based Policarboxilate (PCE) as a New Leather Retanning Agent

Acrylic resins are extensively used as retanning products becauseof their affinity with chrome tanned leather. However, theiranionicity changes the cationic leather surface becoming aproblem for the subsequent uses of fatliquoring and dyeingagents. As a result of changing charges, a leather with lower colorintensity and poorer structural properties is obtained.This paper presents an initial study which analyses the use ofpolyacrylates esters based polycarboxylates (PCE) superplasticizersas a new retaining agent compared to traditional wet end acrylicresins. Properties of PCEs in leather were compared to acrylicresins. For the applying assays, PCEs with different molecularweight were synthetized and characterized using a gel permeationchromatography (GPC). Experimental results indicate that PCEsimprove leather properties avoiding the dyeing and fatliquoringproblems of the acrylic resins.