Bleaching of Wool with Hydrogen Peroxide and a Silicate Stabiliser

A modified factorial experimental design, a central composite rotatable plan, has been applied to a silicate-hydrogen peroxide system to determine the optimum bleaching conditions. In addition to high whiteness, the optimisation was limited by constraints on time and damage, as measured by alkali solubility. The predicted optimum obtained was verified by experiment and gave at least a 60 % saving in time compared with phosphate-peroxide systems in commercial use