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. 2024 Apr 11;16(8):1052.
doi: 10.3390/polym16081052.

Recycled PET/PA6 Fibers from Waste Textile with Improved Hydrophilicity by In-Situ Reaction-Induced Capacity Enhancement

Li-Bin Luo  1   2 , Rong Chen  1   2 , Yu-Xin Lian  1   3 , Wen-Jun Wu  1   3 , Jia-Hong Zhang  4 , Chong-Xian Fu  5 , Xiao-Li Sun  1   3 , Li-Ren Xiao  1   2
Affiliations

Recycled PET/PA6 Fibers from Waste Textile with Improved Hydrophilicity by In-Situ Reaction-Induced Capacity Enhancement

Li-Bin Luo et al. Polymers (Basel). .

Abstract

Due to the increasing amounts of textile waste, textile to textile recycling is of prime concern. Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) represents the most extensively used type of chemical fiber. Its spinnability suffers from impurities and degradation in the processing, which limits its recycling to new fibers. Here, recycled polyester is blended with a small amount of recycled nylon, and the regenerated fibers, which demonstrated good mechanical properties, were obtained via a melt spinning machine. The mechanical properties, thermal properties, rheological properties, and chemical structure of the modified recycled fibers were investigated. It was found that when compared with rPET-T fibers, the elongation at break of rPET-Ax fibers increased to 17.48%, and the strength at break decreased to 3.79 cN/dtex. The compatibility of PET and PA6 copolymer were enhanced by copolymers produced by in-situ reaction in the processing. Meanwhile, the existence of PA6 increases the crystallization temperature and improves the hydrophilicity of the fibers. This study realized the high-value recycling of waste PET fabric to new fibers, which opens a door for the large utilization of waste textiles.

Keywords: mechanical recycling; polyamide; polyester; rheological property; waste textile.

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Conflict of interest statement

Author Jia-Hong Zhang was employed by the company Fujian Baichuan Resource Recovery Technology Co., Ltd.; Chong-Xian Fu was employed by the company Fujian Eversun Jinjiang Co., Ltd. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Mechanical properties of the rPET-Ax fibers with different rPA6 content. (a) Stress-strain curves, (b) Mechanical properties statistical chart, and (c) morphology diagram.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Contact Angle of regenerated fiber with different rPA6 content.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Micromorphology of the rPET-Ax fibers with different rPA6 content.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Phase morphology of the rPET-T/rPA6x samples with different rPA6 content and the inset present the histogram for domain size distribution of the rPA6.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Thermal properties and crystal structures of the rPET-Ax fibers: DSC curves of rPET-Ax fibers: (a) cooling process, (b) melting process; (c) TGA curves of rPET-Ax fibers, and (d) XRD curves.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Rheological properties of the rPET-T and the rPET-Ax fibers with different rPA6 content at 265 °C: (a) MFR curves, (b) complex viscosity, (c) storage modulus, (d) loss tangent, (tan δ) on frequency, (e) Han plots, and (f) vGP plots. (Where ω stands for angular velocity, G′ stands for Loss modulus, and G* stands for complex modulus).
Figure 7
Figure 7
FTIR spectra (a) 1H NMR, (b) Reaction diagram, (c) of the rPET-Ax fibers.
Scheme 1
Scheme 1
Schematic diagram of recycled fiber preparation by in-situ reaction modification of polyester and nylon.
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