Determination of colour sensitivity of dye mixtures for disperse dyes

A method has been developed to quantify the colour sensitivity of a dye mixture. In this method, the concept of the colour sensitivity of matching recipes has been developed so that it covers variations, not only in dye concentrations, but also in dyeing parameters. Firstly, the 'individual colour sensitivity' of a dye mixture to a specific dyeing parameter was quantified by comparing the colour difference between the resulting shade from a normal dyeing condition and that produced by giving a change to the parameter. These resultant data were used to calculate the total colour sensitivity covering the factors, temperature, time and liquor ratio, with a model established based on CMC(2:1) equation. This calculated result simulates the reproducibility of a dye mixture in the dyeing application under certain accuracy of the dyeing process control. A set of dye recipes was applied by dyeing to verify the calculation with disperse dyes on polyester.