No water – or plasma

The dry finishing of textiles and nonwovens has received much attention recently, due to its potentially game-changing promise of cutting water consumption out of the equation,  but while the benefits are compelling and significant, most dry finishing techniques to date involve atmospheric or vacuum-based plasma.

Plasma dry finishing methods are effective, but are generally expensive to operate and are capital-intensive, says Green Theme Technologies, based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which has recently demonstrated a new approach to dry finishing that doesn’t involve plasma.

The company’s ChemStik technology is a dry finishing method uses no water or chemical solvents and is also fluorocarbon and fluorine-free.

“Because no emulsifiers or surfactants are used, and because the ChemStik polymer becomes chemically bonded to the yarn, extreme laundry durability has been demonstrated – in addition to the environmental benefits of the process,” says president Gary S. Selwyn. “The dry treatment is simply heat-cured in a stenter frame, which functions as a curing rather than drying oven. This keeps the capital and operational costs low and the result is a permanent hydrophobic treatment that performs better than C6 or C8 based fluorocarbon treatments, while also exhibiting exceptionally good laundry durability, providing an environmentally friendly treatment that is free of hazardous chemicals. What you’re seeing here is the beginning of the end of wet" textile finishing which served us well for the last 200 years. We will do for the textile industry what mobile phones have done for communications.

Mr Selwyn will be providing further details of the ChemStik process at INDA’s forthcoming RISE (Research, Innovation and Science for Engineered Fabrics) conference which takes place in Miami, Florida, from February 10-12.