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mrboilwash

mrboilwash

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Found an interesting document about potential health concerns arising from textiles.
It`s issued from the Bundesinstitut für Risikobewertung, which is comparable to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Most of it focuses on toxic chemicals typically found in our clothes like formaldehyde, dyes, dye accelerators, flame retardants and so on, the list is endless and scary, but it`s nothing new.

The interesting part is on page 21 "Waschmittelrückstände".
Basically it says despite of the new water saving machines there should be no risk for the health from detergent residue. If I understand it right it says soap and surfactant residue is usually > 1000 ppm under household conditions, professional laundrys usually do better at around 100 ppm. However allergic reactions are possible due to scents, isothiazolinone type preservatives and disinfecting rinses.

I think while it`s generally good advice to hit the extra rinse button when washing with a modern water stingy washing machine, some froth in the last rinse is nothing to be afraid of. It`s the clothes themselves one should be really concerned about. But we haven`t much control about that, have we ?
If something smells odd don`t buy it and while washing before wearing doesn`t help with many chemicals bonded to the fabric at least some of nasties like formaldehyde can be removed this way.




 
I remember the skit at either the 2002 or 2005 WashIn where guys changed all the words to the Abba Song from Dancing Queen to Rinsing Queen.  I think of that skit and Tom every time I hear that song.  I was quite phobic from all the comments here about front loaders when I got my Frigigaire front loader.  That extra rinse knob never got turned to off when I had the machine.  And I'd say for the first 1-3 years of the Duet WFW9700 I extra rinsed every load.  Then Combo52 admonished us for over rinsing when it isn't always necessary.  From the moment I read that text, I stopped using extra rinses on all cycles except delicate and hand wash because they don't do any spins until after the last rinse.  And no appendages have rotted and fallen off my body nor do I have any rashes or some such nonsense on my body.  Even on the precipitous Normal/Casual.  I don't use LCB either.  Just Tide He with Bleach powder on Allergen and either the 130 degree or 153 degree wash temp of Sanitize water temp.  And find the rinse results not an issue. 
 
I'm also addicted to rinses. I'll be cutting back...next week sometime. Next week sometime has been the plan for some time now. LOL

I have a history of some skin issues. So these days, I usually use something designed with skin issues in mind (e.g., All Free Clear). And I often do at least a double rinse on stuff that has close skin contact (e.g., shirts and towels). I've done more than 2 deep rinses on some items (towels), but I'm trying to keep it down to 2 deep rinses maximum these days.

And on items that don't have close skin contact, I generally content myself with only one rinse.
 
I have skin allergies to detergents. I think it's the fragrances in detergents that set off massive itching and skin irritation including hives. I've used All Free & Clear with excellent results. OTOH I've used Dreft, which supposedly is made for people with allergic skin and it made me itch worse than any other. It seems the older I get the worse this allergy gets.

So I rinse until the rinse water is clear for clothes I wear. Like Lord Kenmore, I'll rinse household items only once or so. And like Tom, I won't wear any new clothes until they have been washed.
 
>And like Tom, I won't wear any new clothes until they have been washed.

I almost always wash any clothes I get before wearing them. Although the vast majority of my clothes are bought in thrift shops, with an unknown history. Even when clean, there may be issues. A lot of clothes I've bought at one thrift shop have reeked of Tide.

For that matter, even brand new clothes in a regular store might not be totally clean. How many people have tried on a given pair of pants? How clean were these people? Better wash the pants, and be safe rather than sorry!

It seems to me I've tried to cheat with packaged items (e.g., socks). One time, I ended up with some sort of irritation about ankle level.
 
When I grew up my mother was the one who told me to always wash clothing before wearing it, and I always have. Lots of times new clothes have sizing or some other chemical on them to give the fabric a stiff or "like new" finish. Washing removes this finish.

But since moving down to Texas I have had people ask my why I wash new clothes before wearing them. "Don't you like the way new clothes feel you get when you first take them out of the package?" No, stiff and scratchy is not my style.
 
Several years ago I developed a detergent rash.  I switched washers and detergents and the rash problem resolved.  With the new washer I always did 3 rinses as a precaution, but two years ago I switched to only using 2 rinses.  My wash water spills into the laundry sink so I can see what type of sudsy water I am dealing with.  So far I am happy with two rinses.

 

Yesterday I did a load of towels including kitchen towels and dishcloths.  I usually hand rinse the dish detergent from the cloths to remove the excess foam but forgot for this load. Turns out the washer added a rinse for me so I ended getting  3 rinses in that load, but usually I stick with the standard 2 and the last rinse water looks good.

 

 
 
Years ago I had a horrible allergy to some new socks I bought. It was one of those 8 pair packs and I just started wearing a new pair each day, about day four a rash started above my ankles under the elastic, by day seven I was at the doctor!

Ever since I won't wear or sleep on anything without washing it first!!

As for extra rinsing, the only time I ever consider it is if I radically overdose the detergent. I've never suffered any ills from single rinses (that I am aware of).
 
The whole point

Of using surfactants to clean, (Hydrophilic/Hydrophobic) is for the surfactant to reduce surface tension, and emulsify... If all goes well, a rinse carries both the dirt, oil..AND the surfactant away.
If there are suds in the rinse, then it stands to reason that not everything you wanted out....is!
Genetically engineered yeast and fungus's have been used since 2006 to duplicate scents found in nature (biotech' sentry into fragrances)
The All Free and Clear Detergent is suppose to be free of scents and dyes, however have learned recently that is not free of optical brighteners.
Some people have allergic reactions optical brighteners.
My German is too rusty to read Mr Boilwashes link.
 
Think I find my 2nd Rinse handy if I believe I have had an occasionally excessively soapy load (or used it one time or another to really verify if I'd set my Water Level properly & had missed the First Rinse, or mainly the Wash where I dutifully inspect it as the wash load commences)...

 

Right now my detergent is Gain Reg. Scent (notoriously as sudsy--high-sudsing, in fact--as Tide) and am tempted when it runs out to go to Apple Mango (of which I playfully envision a jingle for it to the tune of Pat Boone's "Wang Dang Taffy Apple Tango") just for a visit to a typical detergent aisle seeing Hawaiian Breeze & a number of other fragrances--where I cannot make up my mind what to buy, but another matter entirely...

 

We'd had rashes before & the need to test skin sensitivity, so precaution was at one time needed at the time of our daughter's birth, but currently no longer needed to really be taken, in the way of detergent, at least in gauging how sudsy and/or well-rinsed our clothes really are or have to be, via 1 or 2 rinses, and this was in regards to our offspring...

 

 

-- Dave
 
Not particularly, but I have my moments. Normally it's one rinse in the SQ, which outrinses even three on the old Samsungtag. I'll do two if I'm washing whites, bleached whites, or extra heavily soiled loads requiring extra detergent.
I don't have any detergent allergies but I have a nose like a hound and am very very sensitive to scents, so I don't like super strong detergents but I still like a nice pleasant smell. Gain Original is about the strongest scent I can enjoy. Tide Original (Now Mountain Spring in the liquid form) is too much for me. So I'll do an extra rinse if I think the scent will be too strong.
 
Dear Dr. Lord Kenmore,

When my mother pulled out that stash of old BH&G issues from the den closet (mentioned in the thread on washing sheets) I saw an ad for NEW Tide detergent that said that if you preferred to save time, it was not necessary to rinse; just wring and hang to dry. This was probably in the 1947 or 1951 issue when most washing was done in a machine with a wringer, unless it was a Maytag and you had a roller water remover, so rinsing meant set tubs, etc. I immediately showed this to my mother and asked her about it. With her usual warmth, she just said, "That did not work out." I will admit that I never searched ancient volumes of the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature for all of the skinny on "no-Rinse Tide" but I'll bet there was a lot of itching and burning in easily irritated body regions given how alkaline, dare one say caustic, that product was. It even ate up metal in automatics that provided a rinse. How widely any reactions were reported back then I do not know. It is one thing to air one's dirty linen in public, but quite another to admit that you have given you whole family flaming red skin by skimping on the rinsing.
 
That did not work out.

I'm somehow not surprised. Frankly, the idea alone makes my skin itch!

One wonders about the thinking that resulted in that idea making it into a shipping product...
 
Well, detergents were such an improvement over soap and with all of the new wiz-bang, we just won the war optimism, anything seemed possible, for a while, until it was not. Fabrics coming out of soap suds had a lot of stuff that you could see on them. Maybe the gunk was not as visible with detergents, but it was still there and needed to be rinsed away.

Synthetic detergents came out of the war effort because the fats needed for soap making were also needed for making explosives. I think it was the glycerides, maybe, so they had to find a way of making soap, which by definition is a detergent, without the fats so they had to come up with synthetic compounds as surfactants so the products were initially called synthetic detergents.
 
With mechanically-softened water back home, I'll be the first to admit I'm a real stickler for extra rinses on the Dishwasher and washer. 

 

Soon after her triumphant arrival into the laundry, the Miele's "Water Plus" setting was altered to increase the water level AND add a rinse. That is usually enough, whether on a fully-laden Cottons cycle, or the "half load" of Minimum Iron (and its half-way-up-the-glass rinse levels) to yield good results. 

 

The only cycle I have needed to add more rinses to were loads of towels. Even with "Vinegar Rinses," it can get nasty at times, even with very conservative dosages of detergent. Part of the problem is the Miele's very aggressive spin-programming, which means the darned thing accelerates too quickly for the pump on some occasions.

Other times, it seems to figure out that we're washing HEAVY items and reconfigures to compensate, and the results then are very good. 

 

I refuse to add fabric softener to loads of towels because we have several micro-fibre cloths that go in - using FS with this would ruin the way they work, and the manufacturers of our cloths (usually "ENJO") advise not to use it. 

 

With the Dishwasher, two rinses would be plenty.

However the Heavy and Delicates* cycle both use three, and I prefer having the cleanest water possible, particularly if using a rinsing agent - mostly to curtail any yibblets in items right in the corners of the racks. Thankfully, the soft water means I can get away with very the minimum setting and still get great results. It also means time between refills is several months (with daily usage). 

 

I remember some time ago, another member here posted an image of the "final rinse water" of their Euro DW that used only one rinse on all cycles. Absolutely disgusting. Add rinse agent to that and I'm sure it was a delicious cocktail. 

Second rinse is usually still a bit bubbly and "wiffy" of detergent for my liking, too. 

 

*I've used the "Delicates" cycle because it works better than "Normal," which is just false-advertising, IMO. Total time should be about 114 minutes, with a 36 minute washing time. In practice, it works out the same as "Delicates," (92mins) and will time out the final-rinse heating portion if the water is anywhere south of 30ºC/86ºF.Heavy cycles does this, too.

 

Delicates is essentially the Normal cycle with reduced water pressure, guaranteed water heating and a guaranteed washing time. I question whether this is related to "heating delays" as the Delicates cycle should then be cutting or extending times, where it usually does not in practice. 
 

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