Detergent usage and the past

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abcomatic

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HI, Just sitting here thinking about washing in the 50's and 60's. On the box of most detergents, the recommended amount of detergent to use,(as I recall) was between 1 1/2 to 2 cups of detergent. If the full amount was used, suds all over the place. Was that a ploy from the manufactures to use more and therefore we had to buy more or was it really needed to turn out a clean wash? What about "fillers" too, like woodpulp etc? Thanks, Abcomatic (Gary)
 
Several things:

Yes, then as now the idea was to get housewives to use up a product faster, thus go out and buy more sooner. But also at least during the 1950's many housewives still equated mounds of suds with cleaning performance when it came to doing laundry. This was a hold over from the days when soap was the main "detergent" for doing laundry. Many of the first detergents were very low sudsing, and did not sell well as Mrs. Average America did not thing her wash was getting clean seeing no suds, so detergent makers obliged and adding sudsing chemicals.

Many detergents from the period mentioned had various dosages listed on the box for different types of washing machines. Wringer, front loader, top loader and twin tubs all were common.
 
Say Launderess...

Speaking of vintage detergents. Did any of the DETERGENTS made by Fels and Co. contain naphtha? I know that their soap granules(instant Fels), and soap chips did. Not sure about their detergents though.
 
IIRC most of the early detergents were based on petrol by-products, so do not think it would have been necessary to add naptha. The addition of a solvent (naptha) to Fels soap greatly improved the cleaning ability of what would otherwise be the same type of soap used for laundering/housework sold by other brands. With the solvent doing the hard work, less scrubbing/rubbing was required of milady (or the other poor soul left to do the laundry/washing up/house work).
 
OK, the main filler in regular detergents, both then and now, wasn't wood pulp but sodium sulfate. Sodium sulfate's "benefit" is mainly that it's cheap. It adds little cleaning power to the detergent, although it's mildly alkaline and so might aid detergency a bit. It is added to help with "dispensing". That is, it tends to flow better than the other ingredients in a powder, and helps to keep them from clumping. But it also makes a 16 load box look huge, and I'm sure the marketing/sales geeks observed that sales and profits increased the bigger the box.

Wood pulp is added to detergents, modified in the form of carboxymethylcellulose ("CMC"). It functions to help keep dirt released from soiled fabrics from redepositing. In this regard it tries to replace one of the functions of complex phosphates. I doubt that CMC adds much bulk to a powdered detergent in the amounts it's probably added, but I may be wrong there. I have used a purified form in the lab and the dry stuff is really difficult to get wet at first, but in time it absorbs water and in large concentration makes a saline solution kind of viscous.

The creation of detergents (both then and now) from petroleum products doesn't really add any solvents to the mix. It's simply a quick and cheap way to make a synthetic surfactant, and as we all know surfactant is by volume a small fraction of a typical laundry detergent, the bulk being taken up by breakers, water softeners, and fillers.

My take on the mfg's dosing instructions is that these amounts were geared towards truly filthy laundry with hard water. I know from my own experience that when I wash very dirty garments, I have to use 2 to 3 times as much detergent (plus additional STPP) to get the grime out, and sudsing is adequately suppressed by the oils, greases, and soils on the laundry. No doubt mfg's also liked to see homemakers add more of the product than was necessary, but I think most of us would tend to observe the suds level and adjust the detergent added accordingly. One big benefit of a traditional top loader is that you can readily see the sudsing and also add more detergent if needed.

And, as far back as I can remember, most vintage detergent boxes included this qualifier: "Add more detergent for large, heavily soiled loads, and less detergent for small, lightly soild loads".
 
sudsmaster, you're right...

about solvents not being added to the mix. And since the majority of solvents are hydrocarbons, a suspected carcinogen, I can understand detergent manufacturers avoiding the use of them as much as possible.
 

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