Coin Operated Dry Cleaning

[Unimatic1140]

This morning's post on Product Stat has some amazing pictures of coin-op dry cleaning machines that I've never seen before.

Would have loved to experience this as a kid, but I don't ever remember noticing those machines in laundromats.

 

[combo52]

Coin Operated Dry-Cleaning Machine

Fun Article Robert, Thanks for posting this.

The fun thing about these machines is they used many parts from their Combos to build these machines. Until just a few years ago there was still a Whirlpool Poly-Clean laundry in Bethesda Md. that was still using 6 of these WP dry-cleaning machines, so I would guess they lasted longer than WPs 15,000 estimate.

My Brother Jeff repaired the refrigeration systems that these WP units used to re-condense the dry-cleaning fluid as the clothing dried.

While these dry-cleaning machines worked well, it was too bad that we did not realize the hazards of the dry-cleaning fluid that was used both on the operators of the stores and on the environment, I really loved the picture of the Westinghouse DCs with the ash tray next to the machines, LOL, it was clearly another time in history.

 

[tomturbomatic]

Well, one thing working in the machines' favor was that the solvent was more volatile than water so the slow extraction speeds not only cut down on wrinkles, but did not greatly slow the cycle like in combos with the similar slow extraction speeds. I was told by the lady that ran the Pretty Damn Quick, I'm sorry, it was Personalized Drycleaning Quick center in our old neighborhood that the dryer operated at 70F. Bless her red-headed heart, she smoked so heaven only knows how much more working with the solvent shortened her already shortened life. I don't know if the faster spin speed of the Frigidaire dry cleaner caused more wrinkles, but there was a BIG Mr. Steam cabinet near them where for 50 cents, the wrinkles could be steamed out after the dry cleaning. I did not see it used much when I was there.

 

[whirlcool]

We had one of these places near our house growing up. It was 1/2 regular Norge coin op machines and the other half was Norge Dry Clean machines. My mom used to take the living room and dining room curtains in there to be dry cleaned. It wasn't totally self service.

You brought in your curtains to a service desk. A woman at the desk would check the curtains to make sure you didn't leave any hooks in them. Then she'd take them to one of the self serve dry clean machines, load them in and start it. You then paid the woman what the machines cost to run. You'd come back in 5 or 6 hours to pick up the curtains that were creased and wrapped in plastic hanging bags and you took them home and hung them up. On the bottom of the curtains were these paper bands that kept the creases in the curtains. You kept those on the curtains for a couple of days before removing them. My mother said that was to make the creases last longer. Anyway there was an additional $5 charge for the creasing and the plastic wrapping of your curtains.

BTW, those places reeked of dry cleaning fluid and for a few days after you got your curtains home, so did your house.

That was the only place I ever saw self serve dry cleaning machines.It was also a "Norge Village". This all happened in the 1961-63 time frame.

 

[peterh770]

Very cool... There was a drycleaners near where I grew up that had a self-serve coin-op 'division' in the back of the store... It had the WP cleaners... No one was ever in there...

Funny that the pic at the top of the article, the one Norge TL washer that you can see clearly has an out of order sign hanging on the coin slide!

 

[Unimatic1140]

So question for the club, has anyone ever seen a picture of a Frigidaire Rapidry Cleaner?  I have no documentation on this machine what so ever and I've never even seen a picture of one.

 

[philr]

I'm in the same situation as you are Robert! I wish I could see that! In fact, I have never seen any Frigidaire Coin-Op machines! I'd love to find one, dry cleaning or not!  Do you know what happened to the Multimatic you rescued years ago?

 

[davetranter]

Coin-op drycleaner

A launderette near the house I grew up in had a coin-op dry cleaner. It was there from the '60s right through to the late '80s, but IIRC it was out of use from the mid '70s. Not sure whether our regulations outlawed public access to the solvents involved. I seem to recall my mother said that people had been known to pass out in their cars when taking insufficiently 'aired' materials home.

Thanks for a 'blast from the past'

All best

Dave T

 

[tomturbomatic]

For a rough description of the Frigidaire unit, see thread 39953 in this forum.

The strange thing was the perforated panel in the side wall of the tub so it did not function like a solid tub machine. The screen portion was maybe like the filter in a KD15. It also used the solid Bakelite pulsator.

 

[jamiel]

I vaguely remember visiting a laundromat where they had the Frigidaire system...it looked like a Skinny-Mini in hindsight, with the dryer above the washer.

 

[cornutt]

Interesting to read about how big they thought the market was going to get. I was alson intrigued by the prediction of the "universal fabric machine" that never came to pass. It would be interesting to try to design such a thing -- what kind of chemistry and handling would be suitable for any conceivable fabric? Does such a thing even exist?

We had a Norge Village here that had about 10 of the machines. They were mounted in the wall such that the backs of the machines were accessible from the back room. They were all on one central system; now and then an attendant would let me in the back to look at the machinery. At the one here, customers were allowed to use the machines without the attendant's intervention if they wished. I recall the prep instructions being rather complicated; spots requried different kinds of pre-treatment depending on the fabric and the spot, and certain kinds of buttons had to be removed. I know for a fact that they got hotter than 70F during the dry cycle; the glass got hot enough so that if you left your hand on it for more than a few seconds, it would burn you.

 

[tolivac]

Dry clean the curtains---You take the curtains home after they had been cleaned and now put in a plastic bags by the laundry service.You take them out of the bags(bags trapping the dry cleaner fumes)and then put the curtains back up-now they "air out" the dry cleaning fumes in the house.Guess we survived thru this,though.sort of remember that,too.Do self serve dry cleaners exist today?and what sort of cleaner do they use-remember "Perc" was some pretty bad stuff!!!Toxic,and caused cancer!Most of the furnishings I use can be just simply washed at home.No chemicals other than detergents and--water!Thats why I don't know much about the dry cleaners.

 

[whirlcool]

Yup, that's how it was done! I forgot to mention the woman would squirt some stuff on your drapes before putting them in the Norge dry cleaning machine too.

The fumes in the house would dissipate after a few days. The odor was mainly confined to the living room and dining room. My mother had these drapes dry cleaned once per year. I think they were a heavy cotton fabric. They were a white backround with coral colored flowers on them with green leaves. Today it would be considered a Waverly type of design.

Except for some pieces of Karen's clothing and my suits nothing we have goes to th dry cleaners. In some of our rooms we have planation shutters and in others the curtains are cotton and are totally washable in the washer.

It seems like most of my career was spent running uniforms to and from the dry cleaners. I must have spent a fortune on that over 38 years..

 

[keymatic3203]

Hi Robert, thankyou

That's jogged my memory of a long gone launderette in Cardiff UK that I remember from years ago probably closed early 80's

It had the standard row of front load washers and dryers, but a pair of what I now know were westinghouse drycleaning machines, eaxactly as in the photo in your article, set into the wall, I remember thinking they were high up and at an angle with square windows,so different from the domestic machines that were commonplace back in the 70's. So I'd for many years since enjoying aw.org thought they were probably westinghouse machines, but now I know.

I remember as a child feeling quite disturbed by them, a washer I didn't recognize, with a high up square door and on an angle, I just remember thinking how could it work. Well having enjoyed the many westinghouse threads and laundromat videos posted hear, I certainly don't feel like that now and of course I might add I'd never even heard of a keymatic at this point in my life lol.

Also as an additional note, I do remember many launderettes having a single drycleaning machine, but I would say that certainly in my growing up in the 70's most were out of commission and never saw one in use. we still have a few laundrettes around but they either just have a dry cleaning collection service or are more service laundries rather than coin op self service operations.

I suppose the overheads for running these machines would have made them unviable unless in heavy use, whereas a standard washer just needs power hot water and a drain and would not need to have very heavy use to cover it's costs.

Great to see how these machines what ever the manufactures have a lot in common with their washer dryer combos especially the norge.

I Also remember reading a `which' magazine in the early 60's testing coin op drycleaning and the photo had the philco bendix machines, so they were certainly set up in the UK.

Thanks

Mathew

 

[mayken4now]

Nope

Cannot say that I have ever seen or heard of a Frigidaire Rapidry Cleaner. However, thanks for posting about the coin-op dry cleaners. Yes, I have seen the Westinghouse one back when I was say, 3-7 years old in Basile Louisiana. Wash-a-teria that my grandmother used to take her large bedspreads to. I remember taking a peek inside and remember a foul odor or something of such.

 

[neptunebob]

We had a coin-op drycleaner...

I saw the sign for it and I begged my dad to take me to it. So he collected some of his slacks and took me there. This was maybe around 1968-9. The attendant loaded the machine and I remember he had to have 10 quarters for it. The machines looked to be either the Standard or the Philco units. She did say it might take 2 hours so we didn't hang around but must have come back. Then next year the place disappeared and was replaced with a Dunkin Donuts that is still there today.

Did they make the goal that was stated by 1964? If so, that might have been the last year such was possible because the times, they were a'changin.' Several reasons I think coin-op dry cleaning went away over several years:

1965: The hippie movement starts and college students wear jeans, which don't get drycleaned.
1966: Polyester comes out and many women's dresses can be washed now.
1970: Congress and President Nixon form the Environmental Protection Agency which will soon put an end to leaking dry cleaning chemicals.
1973: First oil embargo, price of perchlorethylene, derived from petroleum, must go up.
1975: The Leisure Suit! comes on the market, all polyester and can be washed in the Kenmore.
1979: Second oil crisis, price must go up. By this time, one would have to have a coffee can full of quarters to use such a machine. By this time, most of these facilities are gone.

Perc can be truly bad. Near me, a dry cleaner went under and the owners poured perc into the floor drains and all over the building. Soon, the people in the neighborhood behind it were breathing in perc fumes. PA department of environmental protection had to get involved, it is now a Superfund site, and people now have special exhaust fans just to take the fumes away.

Soon Perc may be banned and the dry cleaner I know of will retire when that happens. Drycleaning machines that use carbon dioxide as a solvent need very high pressure and cost upwards of a million dollars and most people in the business just can't afford it.

 

[tomturbomatic]

The last time I used one was in the late 70s-early 80s and the price was up to $8.00 per load, but I think if you had just one item like I did (a coat) they might have collected the full amount and combined it with someone else's load. All of the machines were in operation and they told me to come back later so I did not get to watch my story on the dry cleaning channel.

 

[ovrphil]

Ad for Frigidaire Rapidry Cleaner

1962 - they'll clean it with their Frigidaire Rapid dry Cleaner!

 

[bendixmark]

Westy Drycleaner

This brings back some of my happiest childhood laundromat memories.When I was very young my mother used to take me to this drycleaning store in our town that had those westinghouse machines.They were incredible so much fun to watch.The man,Mr Macadino had four of them and the top lit up.When the machines tumbled the fluid would recirculate thru a screen on the front of the tub.I loved to watch those machines run.The next town over had a norge village and had those drycleaners,they had 10.I remember most of the time they were broken.The man who owned the laundromat I worked for said he didnt buy that store for that reason.If the system was down they all didnt work.Another town nearby had a philco/bendix laundry that survived into the late 80s and had the drycleaners.When I last saw it one of the windows on the machines was melted like it overheated.The laundry I worked in had drycleaning and come to think of it that man got cancer and died but he was old but not like my father old(91) and I was around that stuff Ouch!