Crease-resistant finishing of jute fabric using polycarboxylic acids

The potentialities of jute fabric to develop wrinkle resistance through crosslinking with polycarboxylic acids, like citric acid and 1,2,3,4-butane tetracarboxylic acid (B T C A), as an alternative to the conventional N-methylol compounds have been studied in the presence of phosphate catalyst by pad-dry-cure technique. It is observed that for jute fabrics, B T C A shows better crease recovery than citric acid at all the concentrations studied. Citric acid finishing may, however, be used in the applications that do not require high crease recovery as it is less expensive. FTIR spectroscopy reveals the formation of ester crosslinks between jute fibre and polycarboxylic acid.