Evaluation of Cotton Fibers Stickiness by Colorimetric Method

The stickiness of cotton fiber is a problem in textile spinning process due to contaminated lint adhering to equipment. The degree of stickiness depends on chemical identity, quantity, and distribution of the sugars. The sugar in cotton fibers may be insect- or plant-derived sugar. There are several methods for measuring cotton fibers stickiness. In this work, a colorimetric method is used for the measurements. In the proposed method, honeydew is caramelized by heating cotton fibers, which caused the color of the honeydew to change from pale/colorless to yellow and brown. Heating did not cause any discoloration or change in cotton fibers. Then the yellow index (+b) is used for determining the cotton fibers stickiness. There are high correlation and agreement between results of colorimetric, thermodetector and sugar content method. The conformity between colorimetric and sugar content methods is more than the conformity between colorimetric and thermodetector methods. The colorimetric method is a semi-quantitative and high speed method.