Cationic pretreatment of cotton fabric for anionic dye and pigment printing with better fastness properties

Improved printability with pigment and anionic dyes was obtained after simple cationisation of cotton fabrics with Solfix E. Different print paste formulations were used for printing cationised cotton fabrics with pigment, acid and direct dyes. Print pastes containing a synthetic thickener or a pigment emulsion showed good suitability for printing with pigment and pastes containing Meypro‐gum as a thickener showed good printability with anionic dyes. The prints obtained on cationised cotton showed better overall fastness properties than prints obtained on untreated cotton. After repeated washings, the prints on cationised cotton showed a much smaller percentage colour loss than the prints on untreated cotton fabric.