Does anyone have any tips for better rinsing?

[launderess]

Using an acidic "sour" rinse for laundry does not remove all detergent residues per se. Sour rinses were used in commercial laundries to counteract the highly alkaline nature of the detergents often used to "break" soils in the days before modern enzymes and surfactants. Sour rinsing was also used in the days when soap was the main detergent for cleaning laundry as well.

Both of the above counted on weak acids to perform several functions:

Bring down the pH of textiles washed to a level which would not cause skin discomfort when said textiles came into contact with skin.

Help remove mineral residue such as calicum and soap scum (which is mainly mineral residues combined with the fats, oils and other ingredients found in soap). This helped laundry look "whiter" in the same way using vinegar to clean away soap scum from a bathtub.

All these methods relied upon one using either an alkaline detergent an or soap for laundering. Most laundry detergents today are neutral to near neutral and in some cases mildly acidic, therefor acid rinses aren't going to remove much. Liquid detergents in general do not use sodium carbonate, nor other highly alkaline substances, and are near neutral. Thus their residue is more surfactant based, and rinsing with all the vinegar in the world is not going to remove said residue.

L.

 

[mielabor]

Detergent test

In my opinion the only way to test for detergent is to measure the surface tension of the rinse water.

 

[sparkymarky1973]

Matthew

I have the same problem in the A3060 and the quartz. The quartz is much worse because the interim spins are extremely short.It basically ramps up to full speed then slows down again. Like the old hotpoint 18580 for example. The pump doesn't keep going long enough to pump out the suds and it then goes straight into the next rinse. The A3060 can be better but also worse as although it has 2 minute interim spins, if there are lots of suds it just keeps making more whilst spinning so when it stops the drum is filled with suds.I tend to have to either put it through more rinses or only wash half a load. The quartz can be a pain like the whirlpool with selecting extra rinses because you can only select one rinse unlike the 3060 where its the mechanical timer so much easier. Oh im in a very soft water area also so have always had problems with rinsing like yourself.

Mark

 

[toggleswitch]

~So how exactly does one go about making a PH test?

Chemcially treated strips called Litmus paper.

Think swinning-pool/ hot-tub PH water-testing kits. Used for aquariums as well.

 

[mrboilwash]

As far as I know, testing institutes use a very high speed extactor after the wash to determine the pH of the water spun out for testing the rinse result.
There are loads of variables like what kind of detergent, what wash programe,the size of the load, water hardness and who knows what else. This seems to make it so difficult to generate a comparable standard like the energy lables. I also suspect if we had a standard label for rinsing, the average water use would go up again and therefore might not be politically desired.
Turbidity alone doesn`t say much, for example some detergents are almost clear in the wash if the clothes are not very dirty.

Maybe it can be an improvement if you don`t use the detergent drawer of the Whirlpool. Some drawers still give off detergent to the rinse water and of course not to overload is always a good advice for bad rinsers. Are all inermittent spins carried out properly ? If not, maybe a lower sudsing detergent can help.

Fabric softener does not remove any detergent but can be helpful to neutralize the pH, because it is usually acidic for good reason.
Are DEEDMAC or TEA Quaternary really fats ? If so I`m going to give up using fabric softeners, promise, but I still don`t believe it. I thought it`s just detergent with a different charge. Hair conditioner is an other story...

 

[launderess]

Quats, IIRC are cationic surfactants, and are used in both laundry detergents and fabric softeners. Quats have many properties as do all cationic surfactants, and the later are often blended with various other chemicals including fats or tallow to make fabric softeners.

IIRC, the huge pink coloured fabric softener liquids sold in many supermarkets around the USA are quat based, as are some of the dryer sheet fabric softeners.

Oh yes, quat compounds have disenfectant properties as well. There are some quat based fabric softeners sold for use to commercial laundries that process items which may be prone to exposure to bacteria such as diapers, hospital linen and such. The idea is to provide a mild disenfectant property to the product so items treated will stay fresh smelling and reduce any bacteria that may have survived the laundering process.



Easy way to tell if one has liquid fabric softener that is mainly fats, oils and or tallow is to allow it to sit in a cold area for a period of time. Just like with gravy or pan juices, the fat and oils will separate away from the water, leaving visable layers. Such fabric softeners also tend to pour in globs and or thicken when stored in cool areas. Many of the new versions of TOL FS such as Downy "Free" are not tallow fat based, but silicone emulsions and stay liquid at in cooler storage. They also do not leave globs of crud around the cap from product that has dripped out during pouring and dried.

L.

 

[launderess]

You Can Often Find Laundry pH Testers

On fleaBay by such compaines as Ecolab.

Or follow the link:

Loading…

www.kittiwake.com

 

[tomturbomatic]

Years ago on the Laundry Room forum of the House & Garden website, a member who was a chemist used the measurement of parts per million of residual detergent to determine rinsing effectiveness. One of the members bought the testing equipment to do some personal testing. One of the more interesting findings was a comparison between the member's FriGEmore and a neighbor's top loading WP washer. After all of the rinses in the front loader and the one deep rinse in the top loader, the remaining detergent in identical loads was the same.

 

[mrboilwash]

There is indeed an ingredient called "Tallow Alcohol" in Comfort. But I have no idea if that is a fat, an alcohol or maybe even a cationic surfactant ? I don`t want to hijack the thread, but maybe somebody knows what this mysterious substance is. I just can`t believe there is actually some kind of grease in a fabric softener, is there ? That would be digusting in my opinion.

Now back to rinsing. That test from the House and Garden forum, was there a certain dillution factor mentioned ?
Would be interesting to know how much detergent is left in an average load. For example if one washes a load with 100 units lets say grams of detergent, how much is acceptable after the rinse? 1g, 1/10g or even less ?