Old Axion

[ralph611]

Hi everyone. Is old Axion from maybe more than 25 years ago still good.?
I tried it as a presoak and it really made a dingy tee shirt white again. Just curious.
Thanks for any responses.

 

[launderess]

"really made a dingy tee shirt white again"

Well it would, wouldn't it? The stuff is loaded with phosphates. At least the boxes in my stash are labeled as such.

That being said used one box as an additive to non-enzyme detergents and or pre-soak. Did the job but don't think results are any better than adding phosphates (which one has in spades) to enzyme detergent.

Long as they are stored in a cool and dry environment powdered laundry detergents can remain good for some time. Have used detergent powders >15 years old and they still perform well enough. Some may not dissolve easily but, that could also be from various added fillers.

Since Axion contains phosphates you want to keep it dry and hopefully the STPP has not converted to much (or at all) into TSP (a natural occurrence over time).

 

[yogitunes]

WOW......I haven't seen Axion since the late 70's

along with Borateem and Snowy.....

Biz is still around, but not the same as it once was...

Clorox2 is only available as a liquid that I know of.....basically just peroxide

 

[ralph611]

Good advice

Thank you Laundress for your expert advice. As always your knowledge on these items is so useful. You are a wealth of information.

 

[launderess]

After the dust settled from the whole "enzymes are a health risk scare", once P&G added them to Tide it was the death knell for enzyme "pre-soakers". Things only got worse as other detergents began doing the same.

Housewives soon realized (prompted by Consumer Reports and other such media), that any detergent with enzymes could be used as a pre-soak product. So they didn't need to purchase something separate.

Biz began its product life as a pre-soaker, then morphed into an "all fabric" bleach/stain fighter that could be used in wash or as a soaking product. Eventually P&G killed off Biz sales when TWB was introduced which again made the purchase of two separate products not necessary. TWB killed off Oxydol as well which was P&G's other (and first) detergent with oxygen bleach, and later even got enzymes IIRC.

One reason haven't bothered with the boxes of Axion in my stash is just that; have plenty of detergents already loaded with enzymes already at hand.

Arthur Godfrey (spokesperson for Axion) took some heat.

It seems the man jumped onto the 1960's/1970's environmental crusade bandwagon. He was called out for endorsing Axion (by Colgate-Palmolive) which as one has noted was full of phosphates >40%).

Am not going to stir those old pools, but at first Mr. Godfrey denied Axion in any way contributed to water pollution. He claimed he product only contained enzymes and that such things "don't pollute anything". Apparently Colgate-Palmolive never told Mr. Godfrey about all those phosphates in Axion and or he never bothered to read the packet.

https://www.nytimes.com/1970/02/05/archives/godfrey-may-cease-ads-for-pollutant.html

https://www.nytimes.com/1970/02/19/...ion-he-urges-use-of-axion-but-also-tells.html

 

[rp2813]

Shout out to Berwyn!  My dad grew up in the yellow brick house at 13th & Grove.

 

[stan]

I wonder

With a box that old, would the phosphates still be alright, or have they decomposed to TSP?
And would the enzymes still work as intended, or have they lost their impact?
Did the tee shirt whiten/brighten because it really had a soak in TSP?
No bar code on the box so it's how old? Can't remember when bar codes came out?

 

[ralph611]

Bar codes

They came out in the mid 80’s in my area Stan. I work in the grocery industry. And I will look for that yellow brick house. Lol

 

[launderess]

Haven't performed any scientific tests

But am using a box of Dash from 1950's or so; when wash water drains it is clear, same as when adding STPP to liquid detergents.

Indeed so far have used up vintage boxes of FAB and Gain (both loaded with phosphates) and water was clear. Oh and used up a vintage 5lb carton of Amway "Water Softening Compound) which was a mixture of STPP, SMTP and water glass; again water was mostly clear.

 

[stan]

Clear rinsing

..Good sign!
Don't know how Scientific this little test is, but the pic shows equal amounts of tap water. One with 1 tsp of washing soda, the other with 1 tsp TSP (not STPP) the one on the on the left is washing soda, and I expected cloudiness, the one on the right is the TSP!
I fully expected it to cloud up but it didn't.
Don't know how if it would cloud up if I'd used well water or added detergent?
Maybe not a good way of testing?

 

[supersuds]

I’m not qualified to know anything about the chemistry, Stan, but in using a lot of my old detergents I often find they perform the way they did when they were new (such as making the water slippery, and not leaving any hard water scum).Some clearly have deteriorated, however. But it’s amazing how well they often still work. I assume any enzymes are inactive, but that’s just a guess.

Launderess, great catch in finding a box of Dash of that vintage that hasn’t hardened into a lump!

 

[stan]

TSP

Will make water slippery..
But being that it's precipitating vs STPP.. And with the question being, when dose STPP decompose and turn int TSP..and how to tell if it has?
I assume the clear rinsing is a induction that it's still in fact STPP, but if no cloudiness takes place in the first place, then my question would be.. dose it in the second place (mixed with detergent and soiled laundry?
I'm leary about really testing with it in the machine with laundry, because of how harsh it somtimtimes be on fabric.
And what yellow brick house?

 

[supersuds]

"But being that it's precipitating vs STPP.. And with the question being, when dose STPP decompose and turn int TSP..and how to tell if it has?"

There have been some opinions posted about this question over the years, based on (as far as I could see) varying degrees of internet research. But the only way you could answer it for sure in a specific case is to have a chemical analysis done of a sample of the detergent you're using.

This may sound totally nutty, but it's become quite common in some quarters for car owners to submit a sample of their motor oil for a "UOA" (Used Oil Analysis) to see how it is holding up, how often it really needs to be changed, or whatever. It's become a bit of a cottage industry.

So if anybody really wants to take the plunge and test some old detergent to see if it has decomposed into anything undesirable, it could probably be done. Not by me, though!

 

[stan]

I've heard

of the UOA, but dont know anyone willing to go that far.. Easier to just change the oil. Do you know anyone that had oil tested, and the results?

 

[ralph611]

Cloudy water

Hi Laundress. I just wanted to clarify, no pun intended by what you mean by clear water? Are you referring to the wash water? I think that it won’t be clear. Or the rinse water? Thanks.

 

[launderess]

Yes, wash water is "clear"

After the Miele, AEG, or whatever drains off the initial frothy water (if any) what comes out is "clear" in that one does not see suspended solids.

Of course YMMV, and much will depend upon what is being washed and so forth. If you're doing a load of linty towels or something things likely will be different.

That being said overall "cloudiness" of wash water normally comes from what was used (soaps, detergents, bleaches and other additives) in first place. Things like washing soda, borax, sodium sesquicarbonate, Zeolites to various degrees are going to make water cloudy because that is what they do.

Zeolites in particular IMHO are responsible for much of the cloudiness of wash water and the "dust" you see on finished product.

 

[supersuds]

Oil UOAs

Hi Stan, there's an oil forum where people post results of UOAs. Kind of information overload, but here it is.

https://www.bobistheoilguy.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/forums/3/1/used-oil-analysis-gasoline

 

[stan]

Thanks for posting the link John

I'll snoop through

 

[stan]

So here

is another test with TSP
This time with a sample of well water on the left, and spring water I got from a freind who lives in the hills here, on the right.
1 teaspoon of TSP was added to each sample, stirred and left for a hour.

Both remained clear as shown?
Mind you I'm not advocating anyone use TSP for laundry use.. but I fully expected to see cloudy water with both theses samples.
This is why I question if a vintage product that once contained STPP has converted/ decomposed to TSP?
Without chemical Analysis, how do we tell?