Error At The Coin Op

[whirlcool]

Yesterday we went to the local Chinese operated coin op to wash our comforter and mattress pad. When we arrived we chose two of the newer Wascomat machines. These were installed about a year ago and believe it or not still use a lot of water. So we loaded the comforter in one machine and the mattress pad in another. We added 1/2 capfull of All Free & Clear in each machine in the main wash opening. We selected Hot Wash & Heavy Duty wash as extended options.

As the machines started I noticed the machine carrying the mattress pad starting to suds quite a bit. The machine containing the comforter had virtually no suds during the prewash. We are always quite good at choosing how much detergent to use and we don't oversuds.

By the time the main wash cycle started the comforter was washing with minor sudsing but the machine with the mattress pad really started to suds up. Before we knew it suds were coming out of the top of the machine!! And then they were not only continuing to come out of the top of the machine but also running down the front of the machine onto the floor. Well, you guessed it the Chinese people came running with a mop & bucket and a huge jug of "the pink stuff" of which they emptied about half the bottle into the machine. In the meantime the air has filled with a scent of "Wango Tango Mango". Now the Chinese are yelling at us in Chinese. We have no idea of what they were saying, but I am sure it had something to do with the sudsing. But to our surprise a customer who was Chinese came over and started to translate what they were saying.

The Chinese were telling us that we are damaging their washers and we cannot be allowed to do this. I told the translator that we used the same amount of detergent which is odorless in both machines and that one oversudsed and the other didn't. They could smell the heavily scented detergent in the air. I explained that the person who previously used this washer probably oversudsed it and we were the lucky ones to get that machine. This seemed to calm them down. By the final rinse on the mattress pad we still had a full window of suds and I was not happy.
So my wife told the translator to tell the Chinese people that we should get a free rewash because the machine was "tainted" with too much detergent even before we used it. Believe it or not they agreed and gave us a free rewash. The final rinse was clear, but after drying our mattress pad still smells like "Wango Tango Mango" even after a wash with All Free & Clear.

I wonder what happened to cause this? Do you think someone really oversudsed the machine before we used it? That was the only thing I could think of. By the time we left we were back on good terms with the Chinese. At least they told us "Thank You, come again" in English as we left.

 

[polkanut]

Allen

Try leaving your mattress pad outside for a day to air out if possible to diminish some of the fragrance.  It could very well have been leftover residue from a previous customer.

 

[tomturbomatic]

It sounds more like detergent was spilled or poured into the machine, maybe by someone who was going to use it then decided a smaller or larger washer was a better choice. I don't think that enough residue from an oversuds would remain after the end of the rinses, although perhaps enough left over detergent was there that your additional detergent set off the suds bomb. It seems, though, that if there was that much detergent there from the previous use, the managers would have remembered cleaning up a mess from the previous customer.

OR, maybe an angry customer sabotaged the machine, like kids who get on an elevator and push every button before I clumsily step on a kinderfoot!

 

[vintagekitchen]

Sounds like a prank..

Local brats used to have a bad habit of keeping a lookout for un-supervised detergent at the local coin laundry.

Why you wonder? Why, the little darlings would get bored waiting for their mother to finish the laundry, (which in this area usually meant tossing the laundry in some washers, popping in one of the Laundromat's tanning bed, popping out to chuck it all in the dryer, and see how nice and leathery their skin is becoming). But I digress..

To entertain themselves, if the little beasts spotted a loose bottle of detergent, they would pour half of it in a machine, and wait for some unfortunate soul to use the machine. Suds galore. The little beasts were usually caught out for doing it, but since most of the kids whose mothers went to that Laundromat pulled it while out of mommy dearest's sight, (the other one in town doesn't have tanning beds), catching them did little good, there were always more kids waiting to do the exact same thing. I started using the other Laundromat, but thankfully that was ages ago with my first apartment. I really cannot stand Laundromats in any form.

 

[hydralique]

Hmmm . . .

Maybe it's time for a reality show set at a Laundromat (or Washateria if in the South, or Lavanderia if in South LA, lol).

 

[whirlcool]

We used another machine for the rewash and even with no soap added and five rinses there were some suds in all but the last rinse.

The way things went it did look like someone preloaded the machine with detergent.
And there were quite a number of kids running around too. I have seen this happen with others, but never with the machines I use.

Coin ops are pretty rare where we live. This one is the only one for at least 10 miles around. Outside of that area we'd have to go to the 'hood to find another.

But I was surprised that the wango tango mango scent stayed with the mattress pad even after it was washed in All Free & Clear. But I guess when you get that high a dosage level.....

 

[tomturbomatic]

When I was a kid and we took the rugs to the coin-op, I was always being told to get my head out of the washers and dryers (not the ones in use). In the future, maybe you should stick your head in far enough to give the machine the sniff test to check for unwanted detergent already in the machine.