What is meant by dry cleaning of clothes? Does the process eliminate use of water and detergents?
As most of the dirt is held by the fibres, pure water is not effective. Chemical or dry cleaning uses liquids other than water for cleaning of fabrics. A wide range of solvents are employed such as carbontetra chloride, trichlorsethylene, tetrachloro ethylene, naphtha (not petrol) etc are used. The soiled garments are treated with solvents in rotating drums. Contaminated solvent is drained off and purified for re-use. Cleaned garments are dried. In most cases of this process, I have observed that water is being used as an additional solvent or swelling agent. If water is completely avoided, then the cost might be prohibitive. There is another way where the clothes are treated in water with detergents. After the wet treatment, the fabric is usually treated in weak acid solution in order to revive colors and rinsed, centrifuged and dried. Garments are finally pressed on machines operated with steam and air.
