Comparison of Properties of Leather Made using Plant Oil and Fish Oil as Fatliquors
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Date
2013
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
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Publisher
Uva Wellassa University of Sri Lanka
Abstract
The skin of animal which has been processed to retain its flexibility, toughness, and water proof
nature is known as leather (Deluca and Longley, 2008). Leather is a durable and flexible
material created via the tanning of animal raw hide and skin, primarily cattle hide. In shoe
making process flexibility of the leather is very important. In addition to that leather should be
water proof to avoid wearing leather clothes, shoes, hand bags and etc. Major leather making
processes involves soaking, tanning, retanning, fatliquoring and finishing (Anon, 2011). Among
the steps, fatliquoring is the most critical step in the leather manufacturing procedure.
Fatliquoring is the process of introducing oil into a skin following tannage but before the leather
is dried (Sivakumar et al., 2007). Therefore, this research was carried out to introduce Castor oil
and Gingerly oil as fat liquors as a replacement for high cost fish oil.
Methodology
This study was carried out at Ceylon Leather Products PLC (CLPLC). The laboratory analysis
was done at CLPLC and Uva Wellassa University laboratories. For the fatliquoring purpose,
castor oil and gingerly oil were selected according to the lubrication power and unsaturation
level of the oil. Then, the selected oils were sulfated using 10% and 20% sulfation levels (Anon,
2011) and were used for the fatliquoring purpose, where fish oil was used as the control. The
wet blue of cow hides were selected which used for manufacturing of cow tung lining leather.
surface area were selected and divided into five samples.
After fatliquoring, retanning, toggle drying and staking was carried out for all treatments with
equal time and relevant chemical recipe. Finally, the finishing of leather was done by applying
color using hand pad and wax using spray machine.
Finally the tensile strength and distention were measured using a universal testing machine and
a lastometer, respectively. Then sensory evaluation was conducted to evaluate the softness,
fullness, loose grain, oiliness in leather surface and the overall acceptability using 10 trained
panelists. The sensory data were analyzed using non-parametric procedure, using the Friedman
test incorporated in MINITAB 16 software package. Complete Randomized Design (CRD) was
used and data obtained were analyzed using analysis of variance (ANOVA) incorporated in
MINITAB 16 with 95% confidence level (p=0.05).
Results and Discussion
There is no significant difference in distension of the leather versus different fat liquors used
(p>0.05). However, the highest and the lowest mean values for distension were given by
gingerly oil with 20% sulfation level (according to the weight of the oil) and castor oil with 10%
of sulfation level (according to the weight of the oil), respectively (Figure 1). Higher sulfation
levels in oil resulted in higher values in distension due to increased penetration ability of oil into
the hide (Anon, 2011).
Description
Keywords
Animal Sciences, Plant Oil, Agriculture, Animal Production Technology, Ceylon Leather Products