Neutral Drains...

[rolls_rapide]

My current Panasonic has static draining, like a bath draining.

I'm pretty sure both my Mum's and Gran's old Hoover Electronic 1100s (A3110) tumbled as they drained. This seems a sensible approach, as the water is kept moving, helping to dislodge dirt from the clothes. I suppose it also assists in flushing the pressure vessel's opening too, especially where zeolite detergents are used.

 

[askolover]

My 20 year old Asko starts the drain while the drum is still but then begins tumbling during the draining.

 

[gyrafoam]

What Betty failed to mention about the old Westinghouse machines was their ability to tangle the hell out of clothes. Can't get the sand out of those. Especially sheets. I'm thinking beach towels were a separate load!

 

[yogitunes]

any given machine can have a hassle of some sort with sheets or items like long sleeve shirts....and apron strings are a given.....

show me a dryer that doesn't roll items like sheets, blankets/comforters into a ball.....we just adapt, and every so often, open the door, re-fluff the load, and place back in for even drying.....

dryers that reverse tumble is a joke at best, good thought, but doesn't alleviate the issue......

sometimes I will pull the balled up load out, flip it, and place the ball back in the dryer, it will unroll, fluff, and roll back up in the opposite direction.....the mysteries of a dryer!

mainly its the fitted sheets that cause issues, and worse for the ones that have elastic all the way around....

 

[henene4]

Reversing dryers

There is good reversing, and then there's "reversing".

For example, the Miele Professional dryer here in my dorms basement runs 90sec one way, 90sec the other way. That works perfectly.
The bedding cycle on AEGs (ELux) heatpump dryers in Europe runs 2min with a 30sec reverse, AFAIK. That works good.
Mieles "intelligent" reversing algorythm is ok. AEG has something simmilar for their normal cycles.

Then there is dryers that only reverse with way to short intervals, or those who reverse only on cool down, or those which reverse like once in the entire cycle.
These don't work.

 

[DADoES]

Forward ... Reverse ...

 
Mine runs 4 mins forward and 40 seconds reverse, repeated continuously throughout drying and cool down.  The post-cycle wrinkle guard function reverses on each 30 second tumble (at 5-min intervals).  It seems effective.  Flat sheets, fitted sheets, quilts, etc. ... rarely have anything come out damp due to balling-up.  The drum and baffle design may be related.  Each of the three baffles has a "dip" in a different place -- left, center, and right.

 

[launderess]

Interesting thing; never have issues with bed linen tangling when using large commercial/laundromat dryers. OTOH at home is another matter. Even the reversing AEG Oko-Lavatherm will tangle sheets.

Happily don't machine dry bed linens often so this isn't a major worry.

One wonders if it large drums of commercial dryers have something to do with things not getting tangled for most part.

 

[kb0nes]

I've always wondered if you could just slightly ramp the tumble speed up and down throughout the drying, if the harmonic that causes certain items to clump or ball would be broken. We have a new lathe at the shop and it has the ability to ramp the spindle speed up and down instead of running at a constant rate. This improves the finish by breaking any resonance between the tool and the work that causes chatter. This would likely work with laundry also, albeit at a slower RPM and not using a 40 horsepower motor!

 

[mrboilwash]

It`s not just your impression Launderess, the diameter of a dryer`s drum has definitely something to do with tangling or balling up larger things.

My first drier was a compact 3 kg capacity Creda non reversing one. One of those cheap toy dryers that vented through the door.
It couldn`t handle anything larger than hand towels. After 3 minutes with sheets as soon as a heavy ball rolled up it would literally jump around because in addition to the small drum diameter it was such a light weight.
Had occasional tangling problems with other regular 5 kg dryers as well but never to such an extreme extent.

 

[rolls_rapide]

If I remember correctly, the old UK Hoover reversing dryers were equal length tumbles in both directions.

My current old condenser Zanussi has a fairly lengthy forward tumble, but only reverses for ten to fifteen seconds.

As for fitted sheets balling up, the absolute worst are the shiny satin polyester type - with elastic all round. How they get into that sort of fankle, I will never know, but it's like a snake eating its own tail.