How Hot is Hot?

[launderess]

Awhile ago some bright blub went around doing swab and cultures of various household areas/appliances, and published his results. Apparently a large number of washing machines were found to contain high levels of bacteria including E Coli.

E Coli is a common enough bacteria, it is found in human waste thus is present almost every where hands touch in some sort of numbers, given one must use one's hands to,well you know. Fecal matter/E Coli also is found on items used to bath and dry "down there", as well as undergarments, bedding and such. Besides fecal matter it is also spread when one passes wind.

Unless one is already very ill, and or suffers from a weak immune system, E Coli in most cases is not going to cause much harm. Though there are some very nasty strains out there, those were not the ones found in this test. However the publication of the study was enough to send the media harping on about "dirty" washing machines, and how they could "spread" disease. Even Colorx now gets in on the act with commercials reminding consumers that just because laundry looks clean, does not mean it is free of germs.

Lots of people make comparisons with commerical laundries and their methods, however commercial laundries handle lots of laundry from various sources. They do not know who has what, therefore must treat everything as suspect since all that laundry is done together in large loads. Home laundry is quite another matter. Housewives/mothers have long been advised and indeed have separated laundry from sickrooms, nursery or other suspect wash from the general laundry, and or added methods to cope with any potential disease in their homes. Much of this is not necessary anymore as people tend to go to hospital when they are very ill with contagious disease.

L.

 

[sudsman]

Laundress

Did you mean sudsman or sudsmaster?

 

[launderess]

Sorry, "Sudsman"

L.

 

[sudsman]

Is ok

It does get a bit confusing

 

[MrX]

European laundry

I really fail to see how the European approach to doing laundry is particularly impractical.

People seem to forget that European machines can have 18+ cycles, not just a single very long one.

European machines do have the option of longer cycles for clothes that need it e.g. towels and bed linen or a long whites cycle.

However, for "day-to-day" washes, i.e. for normal clothes that are not very dirty the cycles don't take very long at all.

Most machines have a Quickwash, Rapidwash or Fastwash cycle which typically takes about 20-25 mins.
You can also press a "short" option on many machines, including Miele, which drastically reduces the wash time.
Delicates, synthetics and wool cycles are not particularly long either.

With regards to temperature:

The vast majority of washes are done at 40C (104F) and, for energy consumption reduction purposes, increasingly at 30C (86F) - effectively cold, just enough warmth to ensure the powder disolves well and the enzymes activate.

40C is ideal for enzyme-based detergents and provides excellent results.

60C (140F) is used, by some people, for towels and bed linen.

95C (Boil wash) is rarely used, but it's handy to have if you do need to truely sanitise something. E.g. it can be useful for bed linen for alergy suffers, or towels if someone in the house has something contageous.
A short 95C wash can be used for things like tea towels, cloths etc
Also, running the odd 95C wash (even once a month) prevents all sorts of washing-machine problems as it very effectively kills any mildew or other bugs in your washer and disolves most detergent and fabric softener residues.

Overall though, I prefer front loaders from a convenience point of view (and I have used US machines in their native environment too). I just find that with a European machine you can truely "set and forget" and achieve reliably good results.
Our whirlpool toploader in boston used to require a lot more monitoring at the start of the cycle, occasionally items would remain floating at the top and fail to turnover properly. It also was disasterous when it came to dispensing fabric softner to the level that it would occasionally end up staining clothes. So, I had to manually add sunggle to the flowing water very carefully in the last rinse.

 

[cbosch]

Defence of the boil wash

Whilst I do agree that boil washing is a dying art and that less people are doing it I must speak on its behalf.
Not only is a boil wash particulalry good for sanitizing things it's wash cycle tends to rovide a throuough deep clean which may not be achieved on a 40 or 60 degree cycle. I do regular boil washes and my towels are never that dirty but I just feel as if they are recieving a really good clean.
As for wash times once again whilst I accept the Laundresses point that 12 minutes of thrashing laundry is sufficent I to like a really long wash cycle. Washing them for up to one and a half hours before rinsing. This may not be necesarry but its a mind set that is in built with me. For a normal wash I would sugest 1.5 hours total at 40 or 60 degrees is sufficent.
What puzzles me is American machines without heaters especially front loading ones surley the water has lost all its heat half way through the wash cycle?? Frther it was my understanding or lack perhaps that european machines worked on heating from cold i order for the enzymes in the soap to work at the cold or warm phase of the wash before heating to sanitize.

 

[MrX]

Fine control of wash temprature

The internal heater just gives the machine so much more control over what's going on in the wash. It's a chemical reaction afterall.

Correct combination of time, temperature and turbulance (the 3 Ts) are what ultimately provides the best result.

 

[launderess]

Boil Washing

It does help to put boil washing into historical context.

Before modern laundry detergents and indeed automatic/mechanical washing machines laundry as we all know was a three or four day long process.

Soaking items in cold water first (with a bit of washing soda or borax) came first. This lossened surface soils and more importantly protien based soils/oils (sweat, urine, blood, etc), and prevented those stains from being set. After the soak water was drained off or laundry taken out of the soaking bath, they were put into a large tub of boiling water or water that was heated and allowed to come to a boil. Boiling hot water combined with the detergency of soap (and probably washing soda and or borax, loosened soils and grime. Heat also caused textile fibers to swell further easing the release of soils from laundry. Boiling provided some sanitation and also killed the various vermin which were pretty common on bed/body linens and apparel until rather recently. Pests such as lice, bed bugs, fleas. In addition to boiling,mechancial action was provided in the way of a dolly stick.

Now, once the boiling/dolly sticking had been done, laundry would be lifted out of the wash tub and examined for any remaining soils/stains. These would be scrubbed out either on a washboard/sink or with a brush. Many people believe all laundry was scrubbed on a wash board, which usually was not true, but rather only stains/soils that remained after all that soaking/boiling. Until modern enzyme detergents came along, hot to very hot water was needed as mechanical action alone was not usually enough to shift heavy soils/stains from laundry. Commercial laundries back in the day were famous for being harsh on laundry. That was usually because the products used required very high wash temps to get the job done. As the prevous post stated, several years ago the average wash temp was around 160F for commercial laundries. This has come down recently to 140F and even 120F, the ideal temperature range for enzyme detergents to do their thing.

In Europe boil washing prevailed even after modern detergents came on the scene because of their preference for oxygen bleaches versus chlorine. Until recently sodium perborate was the favourite oxygen bleach in Europe/UK, and that bleach requires 140F and above temperatures to really get going. Even with bleach activators, best results are achieved with temps above 120F. Lower temps require longer contact times. Recently in reaction to EU banning borates in laundry products, sodium percarbonate has replaced sodium perborate. Sodium percarbonate oxygen bleach will work in warm, cool and even cold water without the need for activators, unlike perborate bleach.

The key to good laundry results is having the proper detergent to soil ratio regardless of water temperature. Commercial laundries spend lots of time with their chemical suppliers tweaking product to load size/soil level to achieve the best results. Without proper product dosing not only are soils and stains not removed, the soils redeposit themselves not only on the laundry, but inside the machine as well. This leads to the muck and "biofilm" seen inside some washing machines.

I tend to look at it like when one is washing dishes in the sink; if enough soap is in the water, oils are suspended and dishes are clean. OTOH if too little product is used oils and muck cling not only to dishes but the sides of the sink and anything else the dirty water touches.

L.

 

[wannapinkset]

Hot water is really important to me. I hate that everything here is dumbed down to the point people have no choices or responsibility to themselves anymore. Hot is 140 f on up. Whites, sheets, and towels should be washed in hot water. I too sleep with a husband and a Dogue deBordeaux and need screaming cheeta willy hot water to kill the creatures and blast the oils.

Its a thing with me. If it isnt hot it isnt clean.

 

[launderess]

Oh Yes, Forgot This One Bit

Hot water can make for some very wrinkled laundry, especially anything made from linen or cotton. When doing dress shirts, set the Miele for 100F or in very rare cases 120F, and have much less ironing to do as opposed to 140F and above. Bed and table linens the same.

L.

 

[bobofhollywood]

HOT

..happens when the machine heats the water internally.
I have used in my time nearly all the major brands and types of american machines to do my laundry. These days I use exclusively front loading machines which happen to be european - 4 types. Creda, Equator, ASKO, and Kenmore Elite He3t which is german by birth. All but the Equator heat their own water, and I have found that I can run all 4 simultaneously and seem to use less water than the old Maytag A606 used to, and do an infinitely superior job all the while.
They take longer to do their thing, but because the motors are DC and operated via a transformer and controller board, in the end the energy useage is still lower, despite the lengthy cycle times.

I like only white sheets, and I prefer 180 degrees F or hotter, with at least 1000 rpms spin. My Creda works really great for this, as it has a hot water inlet and also heats internally. The ASKO takes on cold water only and so takes longer. The He3t also does a great job on the sanitize cycle.

I wouldn't think of trying to get my laundry done in a maytag or a ge filter-flo or a kenmore belt drive top loader ever again. Those all use huge amounts of water and electricity and simply do not produce the same result. I enjoy the vintage machines but am SO happy to have my European 4.

Holla from Hollywood

Bob