Abstract
Potassium permanganate (KMnO4) is used as a powerful oxidizing agent in order to make perform a simultaneous desizing and bleaching process on loomstate cotton fabrics. Experimental results demonstrate that three factors (the concentration of KMnO4, the treatment time and temperature) have notable impacts on the quality of bleached cotton fabric. The effects of these variables are evaluated with regards to whiteness index, tensile strength, residual size and water absorbency. At a constant oxalic acid concentration, the optimized condition is obtained in 3 g/l KMnO4, at 90 °C and 10 min treatment time. The results demonstrate that KMnO4 can be accepted as a multipurpose agent for bleaching loomstate cotton fabrics and has the potential to be used as an alternative method for the simultaneous desizing and bleaching of greige cotton fabric.