General purpose cleaners

Details General purpose cleaners General purpose cleaners

2001-10-02

2003-12-09

Delcotto, Gregory (Department: 1751)

Cleaning compositions for solid surfaces, auxiliary compositions

Cleaning compositions or processes of preparing

Liquid composition

C510S191000, C510S238000, C510S245000, C510S264000, C510S274000, C510S220000, C510S221000, C510S224000, C510S237000, C510S424000, C510S433000, C510S501000, C510S502000, C510S503000, C510S506000

Reexamination Certificate

active

06660706

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to multipurpose cleaners containing alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters, more particularly those which have been obtained by reaction of carboxylic acid esters and alkylene oxides in the presence of calcined hydrotalcites, and—as co-surfactants—betaines and/or amine oxides. The present invention also relates to the use of a surfactant mixture containing alkoxlated carboxylic acid esters and betaines and/or amine oxides for the production of the multipurpose cleaners.
Compositions for cleaning hard non-textile surfaces—except tableware—in the home and in the institutional sector are known as multipurpose cleaners (MPCs). Low-foaming MPCs are those which, when used manually, generate a small volume of foam which collapses significantly in a matter of minutes. Products of this type are well-known and are established on then market. They are essentially aqueous surfactant solutions of various kinds with or without added builders, hydrotropes or solvents. Although consumers like the cleaning solution to foam to a certain extent at the, beginning of the particular cleaning task as proof of effectiveness, they also want the foam to collapse quickly so that cleaned surfaces do not have to be re-wiped. To this end, compositions of the type mentioned are normally formulated with low-foaming nonionic surfactants, for example mixed ethers or alcohol alkoxylates, more particularly oxoalcohol ethoxylates.
DE-A-43 26 112 describes low-foaming multipurpose cleaners which, besides the high-foaming alkyl polyglycosides, also contain fatty acid alkyl ester alkoxylates. Multipurpose cleaners such as these combine high cleaning performance with very low foaming.
Unfortunately, known compositions often lack dermatological compatibility so that, despite a large number of commercially available products, there is a constant need among manufacturers and customers alike for milder preparations which at least reach the standard of known products in regard to foaming and cleaning behavior. Accordingly, the problem addressed by the present invention was to meet these requirements.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to multipurpose cleaners containing
(a) alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters corresponding to formula (I):
in which R
1
CO is an aliphatic acyl group, AlkO stands for CH
2
CH
2
O, CHCH
3
CH
2
O and/or CH
2
CHCH
3
O, n is a number of 1 to 20 and R
2
is an aliphatic alkyl group, and
(b) betaines and/or amine oxides.
It has surprisingly been found that the compositions according to the invention are flowable and low-foaming, even in highly concentrated form, can readily be diluted with water without passing through a gel phase and—largely irrespective of their concentration—do not irritate the skin land still show excellent cleaning performance, above all excellent fat dissolving power.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Alkoxylated Carboxylic Acid Esters
Alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters, which are a compulsory constituent of the MPCs according to the invention, are known from the prior art. They may be obtained, for example, by esterification of alkoxylated carboxylic acids with alcohols. For the purposes of the present invention, however, the compounds are produced by reaction of carboxylic acid esters with alkylene oxides using catalysts, more especially calcined hydrotalcite in accordance with DE-A-39 14 131, which give compounds with a narrow homolog distribution. Alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters of general formula (I), in which R
1
CO is an aliphatic acyl group containing 6 to 22 carbon atoms, AlkO stands for a CH
2
CH
2
O—, CHCH
3
CH
2
O— and/or CH
2
—CHCH
3
O group, n has an average value of 3 to 20 and R
2
is an aliphatic alkyl group containing 1 to 22 carbon atoms, are preferred for the purposes of the present invention.
Preferred acyl groups are derived from carboxylic acids containing 6 to 22 carbon atoms of natural or synthetic origin, more especially from linear, saturated and/or unsaturated fatty acids, including the technical mixtures thereof obtainable by lipolysis from animal and/or vegetable fats and oils, for example from coconut oil, palm kernel oil, palm oil, soya oil, sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, cottonseed oil, fish oil, bovine tallow and lard. Examples of such carboxylic acids are caproic acid, caprylic acid, 2-ethyl hexanoic acid, capric acid, lauric acid, isotridecanoic acid, myristic acid, palmitic acid, palmitoleic acid, stearic acid, isostearic acid, oleic acid, elaidic acid, petroselic acid, linoleic acid, linolenic acid, elaeostearic acid, arachic acid, gadoleic acid, behenic acid and/or erucic acid. More particularly, R
1
CO is a linear, even-numbered acyl group containing 8 to 18 carbon atoms.
Preferred alkyl groups are derived from primary, aliphatic monohydric alcohols containing 1 to 22 carbon atoms which may be saturated and/or unsaturated. Examples of suitable monoalcohols are methanol, ethanol, propanol, butanol, pentanol and the hydrogenation products of the above-mentioned carboxylic acids containing 6 to 22 carbon atoms. More particularly, R
2
is a methyl group.
AlkO preferably stands for a CH
2
CH
2
O group.
Alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters of formula (I), in which R
1
CO is a linear, even-numbered acyl group containing 8 to 18 carbon atoms, AlkO stands for a CH
2
CH
2
O group, n has an average value of 5 to 15 and R
2
is a methyl group, are particularly suitable. Examples of such compounds are carboxylic acid acid methyl esters alkoxylated with, on average, 5, 7, 9, 10 or 11 moles of ethylene oxide.
If particularly low-viscosity multipurpose cleaners are required, it is advisable to use alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters derived from short-chain carboxylic acids, more particularly those containing 8 to 10 carbon atoms. By contrast, high cleaning performance is obtained from alkoxylated carboxylic acid esters derived from relatively long-chain carboxylic acids, more particularly those containing 12 to 18 carbon atoms.
Component b) is compulsorily present in the multipurpose cleaners according to the invention. In one embodiment, betaines are present as component b).
Betaines
Betaines are known surfactants which are mainly produced by carboxyalkylation, preferably carboxymethylation, of aminic compounds. The starting materials are preferably condensed with halocarboxylic acids or salts thereof, more particularly with sodium chloroacetate, 1 mole of salt being formed per mole of betaine. The addition of unsaturated carboxylic acids, for example acrylic acid, is also possible. Information on the nomenclature and, in particular, on the difference between betaines and “true” amphoteric surfactants can be found in the article by U. Ploog. in Seifen-Öle-Fette-Wachse, 198, 373 (1982). Other overviews on this subject have been published, for example, by A. O'Lennick et al. in HAPPI, November 70 (1986), by S. Holzman et al. in Tens. Surf. Det. 23, 309 (1986), by R. Bilbo et al. in Soap Cosm. Chem. Spec. Apr. 46 (1990) and by P. Ellis et al. in Euro Cosm. 1, 14 (1994).
In one embodiment, the betaines present are carboxyalkylation products of secondary and, in particular, tertiary amines which correspond to formula (II):
in which R
3
represents alkyl and/or alkenyl groups containing 6 to 22 carbon atoms, R
4
represents hydrogen or alkyl groups containing 1 to 4 carbon atoms, R
5
represents alkyl groups containing 1 to 4 carbon atoms, m is a number of 1 to 6 and X is an alkali metal and/or alkaline earth metal or ammonium ion. Typical examples are the carboxymethylation products of hexyl methyl amine, hexyl dimethyl amine, octyl dimethyl amine, decyl dimethyl amine, dodecyl methyl amine, dodecyl dimethyl amine, dodecyl ethyl methyl amine, C
12/14
cocoalkyl dimethyl amine, myristyl dimethyl amine, cetyl dimethyl amine, stearyl dimethyl amine, stearyl ethyl methyl amine, oleyl dimethyl amine, C
16/18
tallow alkyl dimethyl amine and technical mixtures thereof.
In another embodiment, suitable betaines are also carboxyalkylation products of amidoamines corresponding to for

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