FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a liquid hand dishwashing cleaning composition.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

During manual dishwashing in a sink full of water into which a cleaning composition has been diluted, the user typically relies on the level of suds to indicate the remaining cleaning efficacy of the diluted cleaning composition. A high suds volume and/or stable, long-lasting suds longevity (i.e., mileage) indicates to the user that sufficient active ingredients (e.g., surfactants) remain, in order to perform the desired cleaning. Poor suds longevity typically leads to the user dosing additional cleaning composition even when cleaning efficacy remains.

Anionic surfactants have been used to provide suds during dishwashing, with alkyl sulfate and alkyl alkoxy sulfates having a high proportion of C12 and C13 chains being found to be particularly effective at providing improved sudsing in addition to the desired cleaning. Such sulphated surfactants can be derived from synthetic alcohols, such as OXO-alcohols and Fisher Tropsh alcohols. Fractionation can be used to increase the proportion of C12 and C13 alkyl chain.

The suds volume and longevity are significantly affected by the presence of greasy or particulate soils, especially when high levels of both greasy and particulate soils are present in the dish-washing liquor. Often, methods of formulating to improve suds mileage in the presence of greasy soils leads to reduced suds mileage in the presence of particulate soils, and vice-versa.

Hence, there remains a need to further improve the sudsing volume and longevity when washing dishware using diluted liquid hand dishwashing compositions, especially in the presence of greasy soil and particulate soil, while still providing the desired cleaning.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a liquid hand dishwashing cleaning composition comprising from 5% to 50% by weight of the total composition of a surfactant system, wherein the surfactant system comprises: from 60% to 90% by weight of the surfactant system of alkyl sulfate anionic surfactant selected form the group consisting of: alkyl sulfate, alkyl alkoxy sulfate, and mixtures thereof; and a co-surfactant selected from the group consisting of an amphoteric surfactant, a zwitterionic surfactant and mixtures thereof; characterised in that the alkyl chain of the alkyl sulfate anionic surfactant has a mol fraction of C12 and C13 chains of at least 50%, preferably at least 65%, more preferably at least 80%, most preferably at least 90%, and wherein the C13/C12 mol ratio of the alkyl chain of the alkyl sulfate anionic surfactant is at least 57/43, preferably from 60/40 to 90/10, more preferably from 60/40 to 80/20, most preferably from 60/40 to 70/30.

The present invention further relates to a method of manually washing dishware comprising the steps of: delivering the composition of the invention to a volume of water to form a wash solution and immersing the dishware in the solution, and to the use of the composition for the stabilization of suds in the presence of greasy and/or particulate soils.

