10

Leather and Textile Uses

of Fats and Oils
Paul Kronick and Y.K. Kamath

1. GENERAL USE OF FATS AND OILS IN LEATHER

Although most of the 20-odd steps of leathermaking use fats and oils as detergents,
by far the majority of these materials are used as additives to soften leather. Oils are
usually applied in aqueous emulsions while the leather is still wet from tanning.
Several oils are conventionally used, often made self-emulsifying by partial sulfation or sulfonation by treating with sulfuric acid. These oils are called fatliquors.
Heavy grades of leather are also softened by the addition of neat melted fat after the
leather has been dried. This hot stuffing process involves softening the leather by
milling it in the presence of the warm molten fat. Although the milling by itself is
sufficient to soften the leather, the fat dispersed among the fibers allows the leather
to remain soft if it is dampened and dried again. The amount of these materials that
are used annually has not been compiled, but it is over 20 million pounds per year.
Aside from softening, a smaller amount of oils and fats as detergents are also
used in preliminary cleaning of the raw skins and hides; to suspend lime particles,
buffer the alkaline solution that removes the epidermis and hair, and suspend these
materials when they come off; to remove grease; to tan certain types of leather; and
to control the penetration of dyes.

Baileys Industrial Oil and Fat Products, Sixth Edition, Six Volume Set.
Edited by Fereidoon Shahidi. Copyright # 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

353

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

2. SOFTENING OF LEATHER
2.1. Drying Skin or Hide
The skin or hide of an animal is an organ whose complex structure can be simplified
for purposes of analysis into two layers: a thin (<1 mm) epidermis and a thicker (up
to 1 cm) dermis. The epidermis, bearing the hair, is removed early in the steps of
leathermaking. The dermis comprises very long fibrils, 100 nm in diameter,
composed mostly of the protein collagen type I. The fibrils are organized into
interwoven bundles. Among the fibrils is a concentrated solution or network of
glycoproteins and, immediately after slaughter, blood plasma. There are also
blood vessels and nerves, which are removed during leathermaking before the
tanning (collagen crosslinking) step, which is the last step before the addition of
fatliquor.
If skin or hide is dried, even minus the hair and epidermis, it becomes a hard
material, like horn. If the skin is thin, this product can be used as a tough parchment, but little else. This behavior is attributed to the proteins and proteoglycans
found among the fibers of the hide, which act as a glue when they dry.
If the skin is agitated with lime-buffered water (pH 12.5), it swells enormously, and most of the gluelike material is extracted. On neutralization, however,
the fibers become flaccid and, on drying, stick together to again form a hard mass.
Before being dried for leather, however, the extracted skin is tanned: the collagen
protein of the fibers is crosslinked to make them stiffer. The resulting product can
be dried to a leathery material that is stiff, but much more flexible than that dried
without tanning. To soften tanned skin, one can mill it by lifting and dropping it in a
large rotating drum or in a staking machine, which pounds it with small hammers.
The result is not satisfactory, however, for a number of reasons, including the effect
on the integrity of the surface of the leather and the inability to rewet the leather
without making it become stiff again.

2.2. Use of Oil or Fat

If, after tanning, a soluble resin is added and the leather is dried and milled in
the presence of melted grease, a flexible but resilient product is obtained that
can be rewet, within limits, and dried again to the same esthetically pleasing
product. This hot-stuffed leather is actually a commercial product used for the
upper parts of shoes. The product is not stable, however, to dry cleaning, which
removes the grease. The grease removed from this dry-cleaned leather must be
replaced.
It is not necessary to depend on mechanical milling to make soft leather. Usually,
after the hide is tanned, it is tumbled in a drum with an oily emulsion (fatliquor). On
drying, the emulsion droplets coalesce among the fibers, producing a soft leather
containing 1015% oil on basis of dry weight. Although this leather can be wet
again and dried without becoming stiff, the organic solvents used in dry cleaning
can extract the oils as they do to the fats in hot-stuffed leather.

SOFTENING WITH FATLIQUOR

355

There are other drawbacks to conventionally fatliquored leather. When it is used

in automobile upholstery, it is often heated by sunlight in the unstirred air of the
parked vehicle to temperatures high enough to sublime or distill the fat or oil
onto the windows. This deposited material is troublesome to remove and causes
some lots of leather to be rejected by the automobile manufacturer. Another drawback is flammability, which can be obviated by a judicious choice of oil in the
emulsion. Further, the oil sometimes tends to migrate to the surface of the leather,
causing an unpleasant film, or spew, to form. Under some conditions it can cause
separation of the finish or coating from the leather substratum.

3. SOFTENING WITH FATLIQUOR

3.1. Physical Mechanism
It is not clear exactly why oil, added as a fatliquor emulsion when the leather is wet,
causes the leather to dry to a soft product. The most cogent hypothesis derives from
the observations of von Fuchs (1), who noticed that the oil could be removed from
the dried leather with solvent without causing it to become stiff. One concludes that
the fatliquor prevents the fibers from sticking together during the drying but afterward is not needed. There is uncertainty, however, about what comprises a fiber. We
have evidence that it is a bundle of the unitary 100-nm collagen fibrils, perhaps
10 mm in diameter (2) (Figure 1). The interaction of collagen and sulfated oils
has been studied (3).
The emulsion of a fatliquor should not be too stable. The leathermaker wants to
control its depth of penetration into the leather by the tendency of the surfactant to
adsorb to the protein of the hide. This adsorption depletes the micelles of surfactant,
causing the emulsion to break before it permeates the interior of the hide, releasing
the oil somewhat superficially. The untreated interior thereby retains its stiffness,
but with only a small mechanical moment. The product is then firm but resilient
(not like cardboard). The released oil, with the surfactant tightly bound to the fibers,
also resists being washed out of the leather by water. Suede leather, on the other
hand, requires full penetration of the fatliquor and, therefore, an emulsifier that
does not bind tightly to the protein.
As noted, when a leather is dried without fatliquor, the fibrils adhere and form
irregular fiber bundles with a linear cross-sectional dimension of about 100 mm.
When the leather is still wet in the fatliquoring step, however, the emulsion is distributed among the fibrils. As the fatliquored leather dries, the fibrils still tend to
adhere to each other but with weakened adhesive force because of the presence
of the oil. We believe that the lateral forces, due to shrinkage of the bundles of
fibrils as water evaporates, causes them to rupture into the 10-mm fibers. What is
important is that the eventual softness of the leather would depend on the topology
of the fragments rather than directly on the rheological or chemical properties of the
oil. The same geometric effect should be achieved by mechanical milling of the
dried leather in the presence of grease or oil, as in hot stuffing.

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

Figure 1. Effect of fatliquor on the structure of fibers in leather after drying. (Top) The 100-mm
fiber bundles in the leather dried without fatliquor are intact. (Bottom) They are broken into
fragments when dried with fatliquor, making the leather compliant. Bar 10 mm.

SOFTENING WITH FATLIQUOR

357

3.2. Components and Formulation

In formulating a fatliquor, one is concerned with the chemical interactions with the
substance of leather fibers, the dyes, and the tanning agent, mostly hydrated chromic oxides. Mostly, these interact with the emulsifier. With the likely introduction
of substitutes for chromium, such as aluminum or vanadium, the reactions of the
emulsifiers will have to be adjusted. The surface charges of the new inorganic materials will be different from that of chromium, affecting the tendencies of various
emulsions to coalesce. This chemistry can be adjusted by changes in pH and
perhaps will lead to other requirements on lengths of the fatty chains.
The neutral portion of the fatliquor can be almost any oil. Triglycerides are most
common, but wool grease and mineral oil are also used. The oil is chosen to be
nonvolatile (for permanence and to prevent the fogging effect described above),
minimally soluble in water, and liquid at about 40 C (and so emulsifiable). Longer
carbon chains (above 14) are better. This has been attributed to retention of the oil
among, rather than within, the fibrils (4). Mixtures of different oils are usually used.
Esthetic properties are resistance to discoloration and hardening and lack of unpleasant odor. An important chemical property for an oil is that it should be easily sulfonated, sulfated, or oxidized so that it can be the starting material for its own
emulsifier. In fact, the most commonly used fatliquors are partially sulfonated
oils, adjusted to the correct degree of sulf(on)ate by addition of more base oil.
One of the most common oils is castor oil, which can be both sulfated and sulfonated. Others commonly used are fish oils, especially from cod; neatsfoot oil,
rendered from the bones of cattle; rice bran oil; soy oil; coconut oil; linseed oil;
and rapeseed oil.
Sulf(on)ation is not the only method used to prepare fatliquor from oil. Simple
oxidation of fish oil with air or nitric acid is another, again causing a portion of the
oil to become amphipathic. The products are often referred to as moellons or
degras.
Leather softeners that are technically satisfactory can also be made from jojoba
oil (5) and even butadiene rubber (6). Waste animal fat obtained from scraping the
flesh from the fresh hide, before the leathermaking process is begun, can be used
after sulfation or ethoxylation.
Although neat fats and greases can be added to the leather after it has been dried,
oils must be emulsified if they are to be used during the wet end of the leathermaking process. Fortunately, most oils can usually be sulf(on)ated or oxidized easily,
making them amphiphilic; the usual degree is 50% of the triglyceride molecules,
so that an oily emulsion can be prepared with excess neutral oil. By artful formulation, the properties of the emulsion are carefully controlled with regard to the viscosity and size of the particles and their affinity for the leather fibers and the chromic
oxide tanning agent. These properties affect the ability of the emulsion particles to
penetrate the leather. Castor oil, unlike fish oil, yields the sulfated as well as the
sulfonated product when it is treated with sulfuric acid; its emulsions have a greater
tendency to break in the presence of electrolytes. When used as fatliquors, its emulsions tend to break in the superficial regions of the leather, releasing their oils there

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

rather than deeper inside. This allows the leathermaker a means to control deposition of oil stratigraphically. As already described, this permits adjustment of the
mechanical properties and leather esthetics.
A balance of properties of the product can be obtained by formulations based on
natural oils to which sulf(on)ated oils are added. The mixtures can then be optimized statistically with respect to the mechanical properties (7).
Aside from sulf(on)ates, carboxylates (soaps) and phosphates can also be used in
the surfactant. An emulsion based on alkyl phosphate emulsifier is reported to give
an especially soft leather (8). Phosphates are reviewed by Fricke and Haeussler (9).
There is also experience with sulfosuccinic acid amides (10) and other surfactant
formers.
Before the growth of organic chemistry and techniques for sulfonating fats and
oils, tanners emulsified oils for leather softeners with soap and protective colloids.
These mixtures were prepared as water-in-oil emulsions, called mayonnaise in
the trade and added to the water in the drum with the leather. They are still used
but not nearly as frequently as sulf(on)ated oils. On the other hand, salts of naphthenic acid are used with hydrocarbon oils (e.g., 11) to make the reverse forms of
these.
Egg yolk was once commonly used, probably because of its lecithin, to emulsify
oils in leathermaking. Lecithin itself is effective as a fatliquor emulsifier (12). Nonionic emulsifiers have the advantage of forming emulsions that are stable to electrolytes, so they do not interact electrostatically with the chromium or aluminum
tanning ions. Nonionicanionic combinations (e.g., 1% nonionic99% anionic)
are now used to suppress the accumulation of fatty deposits or extrusions at the
surface of the leather. These systems are under active development.
Cationic surfactants are used mainly to treat the surface of the leather, making it
waxy. These are typically C-16 to C-18 alkylbenzyl quaternary ammonium compounds (e.g., 13). Also effective are cationic fatliquors from aminated and quaternized castor oil; other vegetable oils are also used (14).
Oils are frequently chlorinated in addition to being sulf(on)ated or oxidized. The
reaction is extended to both the neutral oil and the surfactant, to make them less
volatile and more flame resistant. Fish oil is the usual substrate for this treatment,
but it has been extended to fatliquor from mineral oil and paraffin wax (e.g., 15).

4. OTHER SOFTENING MATERIALS

Leather is also softened, after it is dried, by the addition of grease at temperatures at
which it is fluid. These stuffing compounds are made from wool grease or highmelting (230266 C, 110130 F) mixtures of mineral waxes and fatty acids. For
reasons that are not understood, they must be used at much higher levels than fatliquorsusually about 30% of the weight of the leather, instead of 1015%.
The development of new softening materials is considered to be a high priority
by the international leather industry. Research to find materials that give softer
leather for garments without the drawbacks of greasy feel, odor, and cost that attend

GENERAL USE OF FATS AND OIL FOR TEXTILES

359

increasing the amounts used is proceeding in many laboratories in many countries

(16). Research on leather softeners is driven by the same considerations everywhere: the need to find new sources of oils and greases that are of constant quality,
inexpensive, convertible to emulsifiers, color-fast, and preferably colorless, odorless, fixed well in the leather, and ecologically acceptable.
Examples of such developments are sulfation of transesterified rapeseed oil
phosphatides (17) and the use of bicontinuous microemulsions obtained by the
addition of aliphatic alcohols (18, 19). The stability of these systems promises to
be more reliable than those in present use. Oils from wood (tall oil) can be sulfonated for self-emulsifying fatliquors (20). Polymerizable oils have been used in
fatliquors (21). We expect more progress on the use of high polymers, such as
the already commercial alkyl acrylate esters developed by Hodder et al. (2224),
and material based on elastomers (6). We anticipate the development of novel systems to be encouraged by the demand for leather in washable garments and automobile upholstery.

5. EVALUATING EFFECTS OF FAT IN LEATHER

The amount of residual natural fat and added fatliquor is usually determined by
chemically analyzing hexane extracts, following ASTM Standard D-3495 (25).
The leather is extracted in a Soxhlet apparatus and the amount dissolved in the
hexane is determined gravimetrically. Analyses for specific fatty components are
described in (26).
Fatliquor affects mostly the mechanical properties, measured also by a collection
of ASTM methods given in (25). In addition, the sounds emitted by leather when it
is deformed are greatly suppressed by the presence of fat, supporting a method of
assay by means of the acoustic emission test (27).

6. GENERAL USE OF FATS AND OIL FOR TEXTILES

Consumer textiles are produced from natural and synthetic fibers. To be converted
into useful goods, such as apparel and home furnishings, fibers have to go through a
series of processes such as spinning, weaving, and dyeing. The economics of production of these materials demand relatively high speeds of processing. Under these
conditions, fibers and yarns coming into contact with other surfaces undergo frictional heating and abrasive damage and often break, impairing the efficiency of the
process. Sticking of the abraded material to the processing machinery makes this
situation worse.
In addition to abrasion, triboelectric charging is a serious problem in the production and processing of synthetic fibers. Charged fibers, because of interfiber repulsion, do not form a coherent yarn, and it is difficult to wind such yarns on bobbins to
be transferred to other locations for further processing. To overcome these
problems, combinations of oils, fats, and their derivatives are used extensively as

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

lubricants and antistatic agents, known in the trade as spin finishes. Mechanisms of
their action in the fiber and yarn-forming processes are discussed. Oils and fats in
the form of their surface-active derivatives are also used in scouring, dyeing, and
softening. It is important to note that synthetic oils have replaced most of the natural oils in the processing of textiles. Natural oils are used mainly as their fatty acid
derivatives.

7. COMMON TEXTILE FIBERS

With the exception of silk, which is extruded as a continuous filament by the silk
worm, most natural fibers, such as cotton, occur in the form of short filaments called
staple fibers. Synthetic fibers like nylon, polyester, and poly(propylene), are melt
spun (28) in the form of continuous filaments. High-melting acrylic fibers, on the
other hand, are produced by a process known as wet spinning (29) in which fibers
are regenerated by precipitating the polymer in the fiber form in a suitable nonsolvent. Some of the less common fibers are sometimes produced by solution spinning,
in which fibers are regenerated by evaporating the solvent. All manufactured fibers
can be converted into the staple form by cutting the continuous filaments to the
required length.

8. PROCESSING OF FIBERS
8.1. Spinning
In the textile trade, spinning refers to the production of yearns by twisting staple
fibers, as well as the production of yarns from synthetic polymers by the extrusion
of continuous filaments through spinnerettes. In the spinning of staple fibers, yarns
are produced at relatively high speeds by the alignment, drawing, and twisting of
fibers in automatic machines. Stout (30) has studied the role of lubrication in spinning of staple fibers. Open-end spinning (31), used mainly for short staple fibers, is
a more recent spinning method that eliminates the intermediate step of fiber alignment. In open-end spinning, fibers are brought to a twisting location in a chamber
by air turbulence. The stability and the efficiency of this process depends on good
fiber cohesion, which prevents yarn breakage. Treating the staple fiber with an oil
promotes fiber cohesion, in addition to lubrication against hard surfaces of the
processing machines to prevent abrasive damage.
Melt or solution spinning of synthetic fibers is a marvel of modern technology.
Fiber lubrication, which is of the utmost importance in this high-speed process, is
achieved by the application of spin finisha combination of oils and surfactants. A
typical spin line for the production of polyester staple fiber is shown schematically
in Figure 2. The number of filaments, which can vary from tens to thousands, come
into contact with various parts of the machinery, some of which are heated for proper fiber modification. To replenish the lost finish and to ensure adequate lubrication,

PROCESSING OF FIBERS

361

Figure 2. Schematic of a typical spin line for the production of staple fibers.

the finish is applied more than once at strategic locations along the spin line. Spin
finishes are also applied to solution spun fibers, after the regeneration step. As these
finishes protect the fibers in subsequent processing, an even distribution at low addon is an important requirement. Methods of determining the distribution of finishes
on fibers and yarns have been developed (32).
8.2. Texturing
As a result of crimp, natural fibers form relatively bulky yarns. These produce soft
fabrics that are preferred by the consumer. Texturing is a process that imparts bulk
to melt-spun continuous filament yarns, by introducing crimp in the individual filaments. False-twist friction texturing is one such process (33). The heated yarn is
passed between ceramic friction discs rotating in opposite directions, which introduces a temporary twist in the yarn. The twist is undone as the yarn leaves the discs,
leaving a permanent crimp in the individual filaments. The mechanism of texturing
has been presented (34). Application of a proper finish is critical for the success of
this process in which the interfiber friction should be low and the fiberdisc friction
should be high. Formulating a finish that achieves these two opposing requirements
at a high temperature without degradation is a challenge (35). The effect of
volatilization of a lubricant on yarn friction has been investigated (36). The nature
of the finish plays an important role in the uniformity of the textured yarn and consequently in the quality of the fabric.
8.3. Weaving and Knitting
Solid fats, like tallow, are sometimes used as lubricants on sized warp yarns in shuttle looms. Without such lubricants, warp yarns can unravel and break as a result of
the abrasion of the size by the shuttle and the heddle. This would introduce defects
in the fabric and will also affect the efficiency of the weaving process. In knitting,
the lubrication of the yarns is also important. Lack of lubrication results in nonuniform yarn movements that affect the quality of the fabric.

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

9. PHYSICAL EFFECTS OF OILS AND FATS ON FIBERS

AND YARNS
9.1. Fiber Lubrication
Surfaces of materials possess different degrees of roughness depending on the way
they are produced. When two solid surfaces are pressed together with a force acting
normal to them, they make contact at the tips of the asperities in the two surfaces. In
the case of soft metals and polymers, because of yielding, these points of contact
form adhesive junctions. The minimum force required to slide one surface over the
other is the force of friction F and is given by (37)
F As;

where A is the area of real contact (much smaller than the geometrical area) at the
asperities and s is the shear strength of the junctions. This is shown schematically in
Figure 3. When a liquid film of a low-shear strength material is introduced at the
interface, some of the solidsolid junctions are replaced by the liquid film. The new
friction force is given by (38)
F 0 Aas 1  asl ;

where a is the fraction of the surface with solidsolid junctions and sl is the shear
strength of the liquid. It should be noted that F 0
F because a
1 and sl
s.
Adhesion of the lubricant film to the solid surface is an important requirement.
Lack of adhesion will lead to the squeezing of the lubricant film out of the interface
and the re-establishment of the solidsolid junctions (39, 40). This will render the
lubricant less effective. The work of adhesion W between a liquid lubricant and
the solid surface is given by (41)
W s1 cos y;

where s is the surface tension of the liquid and y is the contact angle, which is a
measure of the interaction between the liquid and the solid. As, for a given solid

Figure 3. Schematic of the effect of a lubricant film on the formation of adhesive junctions at a
solidsolid interface.

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363

Figure 4. Schematic of the effect of viscosity and sliding speed on hydrodynamic friction. W is
the normal load (44).

surface, cos y is inversely related to the surface tension of the liquid (42), proper
formulation of a lubricant to maximize W by adjusting s and cos y is important.
The solidliquid interaction parameter, cos y, also plays an important role in the
spreading and penetration of the liquid lubricant into the yarn (43). This type of
friction at low sliding speed is known as boundary friction, and lubrication in
this regime is known as boundary lubrication (38).
A different frictional behavior is observed in the lubrication of fibers and yarns at
high speeds (44). Friction appears to increase with the sliding speed. Hydrodynamic
origin of this behavior was first explained by Reynolds (45) based on the lubrication
of bearings rotating at high speeds. According to this theory, at high rates of shear,
hydrodynamic pressure is generated in the lubricant film, which supports the
normal load at the interface. The friction coefficient is found to be a function of
the product of viscosity (Z) and the sliding speed V. This relationship between
the friction coefficient (m) and ZV is seen in the hydrodynamic region of
Figure 4, at high values of ZV=W (44). In the boundary friction regime, at low
values of ZV=W, high friction results from the solidsolid junctions. Under these
conditions, abrasive wear is the result. As the formation of adhesive junctions is a
time-dependent phenomenon, at high sliding speeds, fewer adhesive junctions are
formed, and therefore, friction decreases with an increase in sliding speed.
Stick-slip phenomenon, which is characteristic of boundary friction, disappears
(46). In the hydrodynamic region, on the other hand, high coefficients of friction
need not be indicative of abrasive wear. In this friction regime, under the conditions
of good adhesion, a lubricating finish film is always present at the solidsolid
interface.

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

Figure 5. Geometry of a liquid bridge between two filaments.

9.2. Fiber Adhesion

Adhesion between the filaments of a yarn is an important requirement in processing
of fibers. Twist contributes significantly to yarn cohesion. In the case of low-twist
continuous filament yarns, filament adhesion can be improved considerably by the
application of a liquid finish. Liquid bridges are formed by the applied finish, and
the capillary pressure of these liquid bridges is responsible for the increase in
cohesion. This is shown schematically in Figure 5 (47). The force per unit length
of the fibers is given by

F 2s sinj y

2Rs sin j cosj y

;
R1  cos j d

where R is the fiber radius, 2d is the distance between the fibers, j is the half-angle
subtended by the liquid bridge at the center of the fibers, y is the contact angle, and
s is the liquid surface tension. The first term on the right-hand side is the attraction
due to the component of surface tension parallel to the line joining the fiber centers.
The second term is the Laplace pressure of the liquid bridge, whose magnitude
depends on y. It is at a maximum when y 0, and is negative when y > p=2.
Therefore, repulsion between the fibers is possible if the second term in Equation 4
becomes negative and is numerically larger than the first. Physically, this means
liquidair interface of the bridge is convex rather than concave. It is important to
note that the presence of liquid bridges in the yarn makes a small but significant
contribution to the strength of the yarn (47).

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365

10. OILS AND FATS IN TEXTILE PROCESSING

10.1. Natural vs. Synthetic Oils
Although natural oils can be used as lubricants and processing aids in textiles, they
have some serious drawbacks. As a result of unsaturation, these molecules adsorb
strongly on fiber surfaces and are not completely washed off the finished goods. The
residues form resinous products by autoxidation in the presence of oxygen leading
to yellowing (48). Oils with conjugated double bonds in the fatty acids are even
worse in this regard. Storage stability of these goods is poor in warehouses and in
the presence of ultraviolet light. As a result of this, in modern textile processing,
synthetic oils are preferred over their natural counterparts. Saturated fatty acids
from natural oils and fats find their way into surfactants in scouring and dyeing
and as antistatic agents in spin-finish formulations. Uses of these surfactants in
the textile industry have been reviewed extensively (49,50).
10.2. Spinning
The commercial importance of spin finishes can be realized from the sheer volume
of synthetic fibers produced. For the year 2000, the production figures of the three
major synthetic fibers, e.g., polyester, polyamide (nylon), and poly(acrylonitrile)
were approximately 18, 4, and 3 million tons, respectively (51). If spin finishes
are applied at 0.250.5% level, the annual requirement of these finishes will be
in the range of 70140 thousand tons. This has given rise to industries that supply
spin-finish components and completely formulated spin finishes for specific
applications (52). An experimental nonproprietory spin finish formulation supplied
to TRI/Princeton by Henkel Corp. follows:
UCON 50 HB 660 (lubricant),
Butyl stearate,
Oleic acid,
KOH (45% aqueous),
POE (6) nonyl phenol,
POE (2) ethyl hexyl K salt,

66.0%
8.5
8.5
2.8
10.0
4.2

UCON is a random copolymer of ethylene oxide (EO) and propylene oxide (PO)
and can be considered as a synthetic oil. POE is poly(oxyethylene), which is a
homopolymer of EO. Random EO-PO copolymers are typical of synthetic oils
used as lubricants in textile processing (53, 54). PLURONICS (BASF) are block
copolymers of EO and PO. Both of these copolymers can be produced with viscosities ranging from that of a thin oil to that of a thick paste. Oils of appropriate
viscosity give hydrodynamic lubrication in the high-speed spinning of synthetic
fibers. The hydrophilelipophile balance (HLB) in these polymers can be varied,
by changing the EOPO composition, to suit the aqueous solubility requirements.
The other major synthetic oils used in textile processing are the silicone oils, based on
the polymers of dimethyl siloxane, (CH3)3Si
O
(
Si(CH3)2
O
)nSi (CH3)3 (55).

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LEATHER AND TEXTILE USES OF FATS AND OILS

Similar to the copolymers of EO/PO, these polymers can also be produced with a
range of molecular weights and varying viscosities. In contrast to the EOPO copolymers, these have much lower surface energies and spread easily on a surface to
give very thin films. Therefore, they make rather poor boundary lubricants. However, because of the low surface tension and high wettability with other surfaces,
they make good hydrodynamic lubricants (42). For the same reasons, these oils
are often used in soil and water-repellent treatments of fabrics (56, 57). More
recently silicone oils have been combined with POEs and EOPO copolymers to
produce surfactants with varying HLB numbers and are used as lubricants and
emulsifying and spreading agents (58). In general, silicones are known to be better
lubricants than the EOPO-based copolymers. The brief nature of this review
precludes detailed discussion of the rather voluminous literature available in this
area.
Mineral oils of different viscosity are used in the spinning of natural and synthetic fibers (59). These are paraffins of varying molecular weights, byproducts
of the petroleum industry.
Apart from lubricants, spin finishes contain antistatic and spreading and emulsifying agents. These are generally alkyl sulfates, alkylbenzene sulfonates, sulfonated
fats and oils and poly(ethylene glycol)-modified fatty acids, fatty acid amides, fatty
alcohols, and fatty amines. Potassium alkyl phosphates are extensively used in the
production of polyester staple fibers.
10.3. Scouring
Here oils and fats are used principally as detergents and wetting agents in the cleaning of natural fibers, to remove, for example, fats and waxes from cotton and wool
(60) and in removing finishes used as processing aids in the manufacture of synthetics. Generally, anionic surfactants are used in this process. As most natural
and synthetic fibers have negative charges on the surfaces, anionics will not adsorb
strongly and therefore can be rinsed out easily. Among the nonionic surfactants,
alkyl, alkylphenol, fatty acid, and fatty-acid-amide-modified POEs are more common. The pH of the bath is an important consideration in the selection of the proper
surfactants.
10.4. Dyeing
In dyeing, surfactants are used as wetting agents. They are also used in the formulation of disperse dyes. A stable suspension of the dye is prepared with the help of
an anionic surfactant, such as alkyl or aryl alkyl sulfonate. It has been shown that
dyeing takes place through the aqueous phase by the slow dissolution of the solid
dye particles (61, 62). The presence of the surfactant helps the dissolution of
the dye.
In special cases, cationic surfactants are used as dye-leveling agents (63, 64).
Cationic dyes with temperature-sensitive diffusion coefficients often yield non-uniform shades, because of the difficulty of maintaining constant temperatures in large

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industrial dye baths. Cationic surfactants used in these dye baths diffuse into the
fiber ahead of the dye molecules and occupy some of the sites. This, in general,
reduces the rate of dyeing, but improves uniformity. Overall dye uptake is not affected
because at the end of the process the surfactant molecules are displayed by the dye molecules. Quaternized long-chain surfactants are generally used for this purpose.
10.5. Softening
Fabrics often feel rough after scouring and washing. Ionic as well as nonionic surfactants are used to soften such fabrics (65). Several mechanisms have been suggested for the softening effect. In the case of low-molecular-weight ionic and
nonionic surfactants, softening has been attributed to the moisturizing and lubrication of the fibers in the fabric. When the interfiber friction is low, the fabric deforms
easily by the slippage of fibers over one another. This results in a softer hand. As
a result of low molecular weight and lack of substantivity, these effects tend to be
temporary, and the fabric needs to be treated after every wash. A more permanent
softening is achieved by the surface deposition of an elastomeric polymer, which
forms interfiber bonds. Surface-deposited silicones (66) are known to be superior
in this respect. A principal drawback of these polymeric softeners is that they interfere with the water absorbency of the fabric because of their hydrophobic nature. A
rather unusual application of silicones is in the shrink proofing of wool garments
(67). In this instance, the interfiber bridges prevent unidirectional fiber migrations
that otherwise would lead to the felting of the fabric.
11. CONCLUDING REMARKS
The foregoing discussion shows the importance of oils and fats in the processing of
textiles. As a result of oxidative stability, synthetic oils have superseded their natural counterparts. However, fatty acids from natural oils still play an important role
in the processing of textiles. There is considerable pressure on the textile industry to
reduce the amounts of these additives, or to eliminate them completely, because of
the environmental implications of the effluents (68). In response to this, considerable effort is being made in the industry to develop additive-free processes.

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