Orclever Proceedings of Research and Development

Caustic Recovery Unit Design for Mercerization Machines

Ceylin Alperen

DMS Dilmenler Makine ve Tekstil Ar-Ge Merkezi

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7024-5992

Özgür Avcu

DMS Dilmenler Makine ve Tekstil Ar-Ge Merkezi

https://orcid.org/0009-0002-4822-8111

DOI: https://doi.org/10.56038/oprd.v3i1.403

Keywords: Mercerization, Caustic Recovery, Pre-treatment

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Abstract

The products of the textile industry are very important in our lives, but the textile industry comes to the fore with its impact on the environment, excessive water consumption and waste production. In this study; Existing techniques based on less waste production in the textile industry were examined. With the textile finishing processes applied today, it is possible to give cotton fiber a structure similar to that of synthetic fibers. The most important finishing process that changes the physical and characteristic properties of cotton fiber is mercerization. Mercerization is a pre-treatment process applied to cotton fibers. The weak caustic, which is the output of the mercerizing processes, is discharged into the channel from the stabilization unit. The caustic recovery system designed by our company uses gradual evaporation and condensation principles to evaporate water from waste weak caustic and obtain strong recycled caustic. Recovered strong caustic is used repeatedly in mercerizing processes. In order to serve the fabric quality expectation, recycled caustic can be cleaned using hydrogen peroxide if desired. This study aims to recycle the caustic used in the mercerizing machine. A new process will be developed with a pre- causticizing system. By reducing caustic consumption with the package type caustic recovery unit to be designed, by eliminating the alkaline waste water problem in the mercerizing machine, by reducing the use of chemicals required for neutralization, pollution of nature will be largely prevented and energy savings will be achieved with the heat recovery unit to be designed. It has been determined that the recovery of caustic in textile facilities that use high amounts of caustic, such as the mercerization process, is both economically and environmentally beneficial.

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