Analyses of two azo dyes by high-performance liquid chromatography.

Two structurally similar azo dyes, Direct Blue No. 6 and Direct Blue No. 15, are analyzed by separate reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) systems utilizing a dual-wavelength UV/visible detector at 254 and 546 nm. Each dye contains more than 35 impurity peaks. Different lots of each dye are compared by means of their respective chromatographic profiles. The system used to obtain a chromatographic profile for each dye is adapted to make comparisons of the major component in different lots by an internal standard method. These methods are reproducible, giving relative standard deviations ranging from approximately 1 to 5%. These HPLC systems are adaptable for the analysis of other structurally similar dyes.