Cleaning compositions for solid surfaces – auxiliary compositions – Cleaning compositions or processes of preparing – For cleaning a specific substrate or removing a specific...
Patent
1998-07-27
1999-11-09
Douyon, Lorna M.
Cleaning compositions for solid surfaces, auxiliary compositions
Cleaning compositions or processes of preparing
For cleaning a specific substrate or removing a specific...
510334, 510406, 510418, 510507, 510515, 8137, C11D 308, C11D 312, C11D 1704, D06M 1177
Patent
active
059814594
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
The invention relates to a foam for treating textile fabrics.
The preparation and use of foams for domestic fabric conditioning, in particular for fabric conditioning in a drying machine is known.
U.S. Pat. No. 242 377, issued Dec. 30th, 1980, describes foaming compositions comprising conditioning agents such as cationic surfactants. It is disclosed that fabrics are washed in a conventional laundry process, and that the freshly washed fabrics are then put into a dryer with the conditioning foam. In this way the anionic surfactants used in the washing process, and the cationic surfactants used in the foam conditioning cycle, do not interact or complex with each other.
The aim of the present invention is to provide foam which both cleans and conditions the fabric in a single process (i.e. Softening-through-the-wash benefits).
A further aim of the invention is to improve the stability of a foam.
These objectives are achieved by fully or partly replacing cationic surfactant in the prior art composition by clay, thereby realising softness benefits whilst avoiding the problem of undesirable cationic/anionic complexing. Furthermore, it is surprising that clay improves foam stability. According to J. J. Bikerman "Foams", Springer-Verlag New York Inc., 1973, clay gives poor foam stability (bentonite on page 155, line 12) and colloidal clays (paragraph spanning pages 251 and 252). Improved foam stability in turn means that less propellant is required in order to generate light (i.e. low density) foams.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention concerns a foam for treating textile fabrics, the foam comprising a fabric softening clay. It is preferred that the foam comprises from 0.1% to 20% by weight of fabric softening clay, and the clay is preferably selected from the group consisting of montmorillonite, saponite, hectorite or mixtures thereof.
In a further aspect of the invention the foam may be dispensed from aerosol containers by means of a liquid or gaseous propellant. Carbon dioxide gas is most preferred as propellant. In this aspect of the invention a packaged product is provided comprising: inside the container.
In a still further aspect of the invention a method of cleaning and conditioning textile fabrics is provided comprising the steps of either applying a clay-containing foam to the textile fabric and subsequently removing foam residues, preferably by rinsing or by vacuum; or, alternatively dissolving a clay-containing foam to form an aqueous solution and immersing the textile fabric in the aqueous solution.
The methods of the invention may be carried out by hand, or in a washing machine.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Foam is a coarse dispersion of gas in a relatively small amount of liquid. The foams of the present invention are a continuous liquid phase comprising a composition, and a dispersed phase comprising a gas. Typically, the gas "bubbles" of the dispersed phase can vary in size from 50 micrometers to several millimetres.
In general, the quality of the foam is determined by assessing various foam quality attributes, such as: 1) the appearance of the foam as it is determined by the uniformity of the bubble size distribution, as well as by the actual bubble sizes, wherein small and uniformly sized bubbles are generally preferred; 2) the thickness of the foam as it is determined by the apparent foam viscosity, wherein a greater apparent foam viscosity is generally preferred; 3) the density of the foam which is preferably less than 250 g/l, more preferably less than 150 g/l, and most preferably less than 100 g/l; and 4) the drainage of the liquid from the foam upon standing on a solid surface, wherein slow drainage of the liquid is generally preferred.
Preferred components of the detergent foam will now be described in more detail.
Water-soluble salts of the higher fatty acids, i.e., "soaps", are useful anionic surfactants in the compositions herein. This includes alkali metal soaps such as the sodium, potassium, ethanolamine, ammonium, and alkylammonium salts of higher fatty acids contai
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Verbiest Jan Hendrik Maria
Wevers Jean
Douyon Lorna M.
Goodrich D. Mitchell
Rasser Jacobus C.
The Procter & Gamble & Company
Zerby Kim William
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