SOLUBILITY DIAGRAMS AND WASHING EFFICIENCY OF BUILDER SURFACTANT MIXTURES/

Builders are chemical compounds used in detergent formulations to enha nce the action of surfactants in the washing process. Controversy surr ounds the advantages of replacing a conventional builder such as sodiu m tripolyphosphate (STPP) by a ternary mixture based on Zeolite A, sod ium carbonate and an organic polymer. This paper presents a comparativ e study on the washing efficiency of both builders as a function of bu ilder/surfactant ratio, total content of builder and surfactant and wa ter hardness. Solubility diagrams are presented only for the STPP buil der, because the ternary mixture builder showed turbity in all cases.