Ultrasonic washing of textiles

• We demonstrate that acoustic cavitation bubbles effectively remove contaminants from textiles.
• The high-speed visualization of the contaminant removal by cavitation bubbles is reported.
• We suggest a hybrid washing scheme of textiles that achieves a markedly enhanced washing performance.

We present the results of experimental investigation of ultrasonic washing of textiles. The results demonstrate that cavitation bubbles oscillating in acoustic fields are capable of removing soils from textiles. Since the washing performance is mitigated in a large washing bath when using an ultrasonic transducer, we propose a novel washing scheme by combining the ultrasonic vibration with a conventional washing method utilizing kinetic energy of textiles. It is shown that the hybrid washing scheme achieves a markedly enhanced performance up to 15% in comparison with the conventional washing machine. This work can contribute to developing a novel laundry machine with reduced washing time and waste water.