Sustainable denim fabric washing with post-used rubber shoe sole: An eco-friendly alternative of Pumice stone

Abstract

Background/Objective: Denim fabric is the most versatile dress material and acclaimed the most popular among the young generations due to its trendy looks. Since stone is being vastly used to improve the softness and comfort feeling along with fading effects, but bearing some problems. For instance, stone leads to deterioration of fabric strength, machine wear, and tear, grit deposition in the effluent plant, increasing labor cost to separate the stone powder from the pockets, and also harmful for the expensive laundry machine, etc. On the contrary, post-used rubber shoe soles are thrown or burnt which leads to ozone depletion. Therefore, this study was carried out to mitigate both the existing problems of stone washing and also this endeavor was done to find a suitable alternative of pumice stone. Methods: Washing was continued with both stones, collected rubber shoe sole against enzyme, acid, and bleaching agent. Eventually, washed garments have been tested and compared with the unwashed regular ones, based on visual appearance, degree of shade change, tensile strength, tear strength, abrasion resistance, and weight per unit area, and crimp interchange. Findings: Result reveals the satisfactory values, but the degree of shade changes against acid has poor value due to not having the absorption ability of potassium permanganate (KMnO 4). Also, the result tells the noise intensity is much lower (68-72 dB) compared to stonewash (89-90 dB). Introducing the aforementioned alternative in denim washing, it shows the perfect results rather than stone one without compromising the trendy looks.

Use of Natural and Synthetic Materials in Denim Washing Process as an Alternative to Pumice Stone

“…An effective measure for sustainable denim washing against stone washing with pumice might be the investigation of the use of synthetic and natural stones, while only a few studies appeared in the literature on the use of alternative materials for stone washing. Alam et al [19] used post-used shoe soles for stone washing of denim garments instead of pumice stone. Chattopadhyay and Pachauri [20] produced a series of synthetic stones composed of different amounts of calcium carbonate as filler material and silicon dioxide and aluminum as abrasive materials.…”

A Sustainable Denim Washing Process Uses Coconut Husk Instead of Conventional Stone

“…As a concrete example, stone causes fabric strength to decrease because of machine wear and tear (4) , grit deposition on the environment and in the effluent plant, an increase in labor costs to remove the stone powder from the pockets, wear, and tear for expensive washing machines, etc. (5,6) . To avoid using stone, experts are looking for acceptable substitutes (7) .…”