Fighting the yellowing process

White stands for elegance and often associated with high class and high quality. Sadly, the high clean factor of the color white is also a pitfall, as white clothes get visibly dirty in nearly all circumstances, even if you are extremely careful with your white fabric. There are numerous factors that have the power to turn white into yellow and this post will tell you the answer to the yellowing of your textile.

Customer expectations and fashion trends made the brand managers and manufacturers all over the world concern about brightness of their products. The more expensive the product the higher the expectations of the customer. If it yellows after a few washing rounds, the customer will be disappointed and feel let down by the brand that sold it. Sometimes clothes have to be sent back to plant before they have even reached the shop, because the retailer discovered a significant color difference. It does not matter who is right: the customer is king and the customer demands an extreme whiteness. Clearly, brand managers and textile manufacturers have problem to keep their textile white under all circumstances.

What causes yellowing and all of the factors that influence the whiteness of your fabrics.

Yellowing can happen in four different stages of the production and selling process:

In the Plant

Heat setting to stabilize the fabrics, molding with high temperature, adding fabric finishes means compromising the fabric’s whiteness, the heat in the ironing process.

On the Road

Transportation process, the fabric contacts with the sunlight during the unloading of the truck, changes of the temperature due to weather influence and gasses from the atmosphere and the truck’s exhaust. Storage, the lighting of the storage room, the composition of the atmosphere and temperature.

In the Shop

Artificial light, textile do not do well with natural or artificial light. Dressing room, customers want to try on each item before they even consider buying anything, clothes are taken out of the clothing rack and exposed to make-up, sweat and many different hands.

In the Customer’s Surroundings

The high temperature of washing machine. The sunlight, white clothes are often worn when the sun is out. Gasses, wherever your customers go, there are gasses atmosphere caused by different kinds of pollution. These gasses are called NOx nitrogen oxides and are hard to avoid.

The yellowing issue- impossible to tackle?

Because you cannot skip the heat treatments, eliminate the sun and forbid your customers to go outside, you can however, find a way to improve the fastness and resistance factor of your fabrics. The yellowing process can be tackled as long as you use the right products from the very beginning. So, what are these “right products”?

The magic mix:

Based on the newly found information, you must get a product that incorporates the following:

• It should clean the fabric before it gets into the production process so it is as white as possible
• It should protect the fabric against the high temperatures during the production process
• It should contain a component making the fabric even whiter than it already was
• It should arm the textiles against external factors like NOx, sunlight, artificial light and BHT

When you finally found your all-in-one solution to fight yellowing, you must consider two other factors:

• The exact recipe, so your textiles get exactly what they need in each stage of the production process and after
• Technical support of a supplier that knows how to use product, so you get the very best out of it and avoid making unnecessary mistakes

About Tanatex:

The white paper concept by Tanatex has been researched and implemented well over decades. Tanatex has tremendous experience working on products that not only improve the quality of textile processes but also make an actual difference for mankind.

Please contact us to know more about Tanatex concepts, particularly in fighting yellowing on your fabric.