Introduction:

Glass transition temperature is the characteristics of the amorphous region. There are some temperatures or narrow range of temperatures, below which an amorpho us polymer is in glassy state i,e; hard and brittle state and above which it is softer and rubbery. This temperature is referred to as glass transition temperature. It is denoted by T g. In case of crystalline or semi crystalline polymers, the transformation occurs only in th e amorphous region. As a result, the amorphous portion in the polymer softens and becomes more flexible with higher disorder in molecular orientation while the crystalline zone remains solid. This results the increase in possibility of penetration of moleculesfrom aqueous solution like dye solution. While the crystalline region never absorbs dyes, colorization of a fibre or fabric is relevant to the absorbency of the amorphous region. So the glass transition temperature is an important factor in case of determining the d yeing temperature.

Glass Transition Temperature Of Different Fibres:

Fibre name
Cotton Silk Polyester Jute Nylon 6 Nylon 66

Glass transition temperature(Tg)in c

-175 69 -50 47

Acrylic

80

Comparison With Natural Fibres:

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Glass transition temperature is a characteristics of synthetic fibres only while the natural fibres dont really possess this which was seen in the previous table of glass transition temperature of different fibres where the natural fibres like cotton, jute dont have any value. The reason of this lies in the structure of natural fibres. For example, cotton is the most commonly used natural fibre and 94% of its polymer is cellulose. But the main difference between a regenerated cellulosic fibre such as viscose is, the degree of polymerization. Cotton possesses long polymer of 3000 -7000degree of polymerization while viscose has only 300-450. Again cotton fibre contains both intra and inter -molecular hydrogen bonds in its structure due to which no rearrangement happens in case of heating whereas the opposite things happen for regenerated fibres because of their shorter polymer length.

Importance Of Glass Transition Temperature For Determining The Dyeing Temperature:

Incase of dyeing, glass transi tion temperature plays a very important role. All fibres do have both crystalline and amorphous regions in their molecular structure. No fibres can be 100% crystalline or 100% amorphous. So fibres having higher molecular orientation shows different propert ies than the fibres having lower molecular orientation. Highly oriented fibres may show brittleness with low moisture absorbency and very poor dye affinity. The reason behind this is quite simple, the molecules of the fibre pack closely together during orientation, it becomes increasingly difficult for molecules of water to penetrate between them. Because of the difficulty that water finds in penetrating the oriented fibre molecules, it is difficult to for dyes to penetrate in the fibres.But in case of poorly oriented fibres, the opposite things happen as those fibres may show high moisture absorption along with high affinity to dyes. That happens because, when the molecular orientation is not good, it leaves enough space for water or dye molecules to fit in the fibre structure. The introduction of glass transition temperature may be applied at this point as it is known to all that this temperature belongs to amorphous region only. And it is experimentally proved that all polymers have atleast some amo rphous portion which usually makes up 40 -70% of the polymer. From the definition of glass transition temperature we come to know that above this temperature the molecular orientation of the amorphous region becomes more disordered whereas below this temperature the polymer behaves like glassy or brittle material. As it is already been mentioned before that poor molecular orientation allows the dye molecules to penetrate in the fibre structure and gets fixed at the gaps created by the disorder of molecules, by app lying temperature above the glass transition temperature of any particular fibre polymer it is possible to make the fibre absorb the dye molecules quite easily. But this theory is only applicable to fibres of thermoplastic nature, i,e; the synthetic and regenerated fibres. So the dyeing temperature of these fibres will always be above the glass transition temperature. For example polyester fibre has glass transition temperature at 69 c while the normal temperature dyeing of it needs 95 -100 c temperature whi ch is way above the glass transition temperature.

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Application Of Glass Temperature In Dyeing:

Transition

The glass transition temperature is and important parameter of a polymeric material. It is used as a measure for evaluating the flexibility of a polymer molecules and the response to water molecules. It also decides the behavior of the polymer at different temperatures. It helps to determine the processing temperature of the polymer. Dyeing temperature of synthetic fibres depend very heavily as the dyeing temperature always above the glass transition temperature where the amorphous region of the polymer shows flexibility and more disordered state so that the dye molecules can penetrate easily in the fibre. For example, glass transition temperature of polyester and nylon 6 is 69 c and 50 c while their normal temperature for dyeing is 95-100 c and 80-100 c respectively which is determined from the glass transitiontemperature. Thats how it affects the dyeing temperature.

Conclusion:
The glass transition temperature, T g, is actually a composite of several physical attributes. The T g is a useful concept because i t is a way of understanding the molecular motion that occurs in a polymeric system. The degree of molecular motion is of fundamental concern when considering the properties like moisture absorption, dye affinity etc. Molecular freedom influences the behavior of all polymers. At low temperatures the polymers exist as solids in which the molecular segments vibrate rather gently and independently. As the temperature of a polymer is increased, a point is reached at which the molecule suddenly becomes more flexible and mobile. It leaves the amorphous region very poorly oriented and let the molecules like water molecules or dye molecules get in the fibre and get fixed. That is how the dyeing condition is heavily dependent on glass transition temperature.

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