powder det disappearing ...................

[toggleswitch]

Yes the powders are quick becoming dinosaurs here.

The good thing is the liquids, other than really water, can't hide fillers like colored sawdust. (makes you have to buy softener!)

And the liquids "dissolve" much better than powders....

but the other day I wanted a box of blue Cheer powder and the stuff I was able to buy with that name on it was certainly not the Cheer I remember....

 

[toggleswitch]

Pat,

IIRC the Arm and Hammer powder is decent....

 

[kenmore1978]

powders

seem to have retreated to places like Costco and Sam's Club where you buy huge buckets of it and scoop as needed.

 

[agiflow]

Hi Steve

I used to use powdered Arm&Hammer in the previous WP. Good cleaner and cheap, but it was the combination of hard water and that particular detergent that eventually clogged the spin
basket holes with calcium deposits.

Very tedious job trying to remove the deposits which of course resulted in wetter than usual laundry. Maybe i did not use the proper dosages, i don't know, but i have never seen Tide do this, so i pay extra for the Tide.

I started using Calgon in the new machine, but as of late have not seen it on the shelves in my supermarket over here.

Anyhow, enough of this little rant and on to some Friday afternoon laundry. Nice way to finish up vacation .

 

[foraloysius]

Dixan

Pulsatron,

Dixan is made by Henkel, like the German Persil (there is also a British Persil, made by Lever). Dixan comes in powder, megaperls and gel (more or less clear and thick liquid). Dixan is a very good cleaning detergent, especially the megaperls (the pellets Greg mentions). What do you want to know about Dixan?

Louis

 

[westtexman]

Here in West Texas, powders are disappearing as well. At our Wal-Mart stores, powders have only 1/8 of the shelf-space, whereas the liquids claim the remaining 7/8. What a shame. I tend to like powders, primarily because I feel like they clean better. I do use liquids occasionally, but I use my FL more than my TL, so liquids don’t work so well there.

Austin – We have Oxydol at our local United Supermarkets. I really LOVE the vintage Oxydol, so a few months back I bought a box of the new stuff. It really didn’t seem to work all that well in comparison to Tide. Furthermore, it didn’t have that classic 1980’s Oxydol smell, so I was very disappointed. I would love to find a couple of boxes of 1980’s Oxydol!

DADoES – I really like HEB. We don’t have those in my part of the state, but I went to one in Midland a couple weeks ago and found a GREAT selection of detergents. Especially Mexican brands.

Gansky1 – I recently purchased a batch of detergents from the UK as well. I really like Daz, Persil Bio Tablets (contains phosphate), Ariel Colour Tablets and Comfort FS. Here is another great site to purchase these products:

Tex

http://www.britsuperstore.com

 

[Unimatic1140]

While we can still get a selection of powders here in Mini, I have noticed over the past year at Target and the major supermarket that the selections of powders are slowly diminishing. I'm worried that powders might disappear for good because liquids are terrible for vintage rubber. Of course I can continue to buy vintage detergent to use on eBay but it can be terribly expensive.

Greg I too am very impressed with the detergent tablets that Mike sent me from England. They seem to clean very well and leave no powdery residue with just a small amount of sudsing. Seems our products and policies in the US are not so slowly but surely falling behind the rest of the world.

 

[foraloysius]

Here's a picture of the Dixan box

 

[foraloysius]

and one of the Megaperls inside.

 

[spiralactivator]

Snowing powders in PA

I was at Weis today and saw a lot of powders: Tide, Ivory Snow, Gain, Bold, new Oxydol, Cheer, and Arm & Hammer. The Dollar Tree has Sun and Purex powders. Redner's has Xtra. I tried Fresh Start in 2001 when I found some at Big Lots, but I haven't seen it since.

 

[partscounterman]

I miss Fresh Start!

One of the great things I found when we moved here was that the Kahului Safeway carried Fresh Start. It was priced too high at $8.99, but if you waited for the sale (and we ALWAY wait for the sale on Maui-only a dumb tourist would pay full price!) it was $4.99.
Well, about 2 months ago, the Fresh Start dissappearred. Darn! I just thought it was a cool product and low suds for my hettie.

 

[peterh770]

A friend of mine just left for England. I requested she bring back Persil Bio Original, Persil Colour Guard, and Persil Aleo Vera. Let's see if she has room to bring them back! Need to wait 2.5 weeks...

 

[kenmore1978]

liquid/powder

I've been using Arm & Hammer EXTRA liquid from Walgreens, but they also carry the powdered versions. Economical, and seems to clean well enough

 

[JerseyMike]

Same story here. The space devoted to powders is fast disappearing. To further complicate things, I have to use "free and clear" detergents because my skin is sensitive the dyes and fragrances in most detergents. (I have to use coin operated equiptment, so re-setting the machine for an "extra rinse" isn't possible. I could re-run the entire cycle sans detergent, but that would cost more $$$). It's next to impossible to find the powdered "free and clear" detergents. I recently broke down and ordered the "free and clear" powdered version of Sears Ultra Plus www.sears.com. (I've never seen it at my local Sear's and, according to their website, would have had to drive a considerable distance to find a store that has it.) They have a rebate that for all practical intents and purposes refunded the shipping. It was delivered yesterday. I'm going to use it when I do laundry tomorrow.

Mike

 

[zipdang]

The big grocery stores around here (Portland), like Safeway, Fred Meyer (Kroger), Albertson's, Winco, etc., all seem to have ample selections of powdered detergents, although no one store has all the sizes/scents of a single brand. Target seems to have the smallest selection of powders. Most of the big stores also offer an eco-friendly powder or two as well, like Planet or Bi-O-Kleen. And despite the disappearing Fresh Start trend, it's sold all over the place around here. I'm not sure how much of it actually sells, but it's in a lot of the stores. I use liquids, and I'm happy that the 300 oz. Tide is finally available in Tide Free and Tide Coldwater. For a long time it seemed like all you could find in that size was the original and bleach alternative versions.

 

[appnut]

I was in HEB this morning. In addition to all the Tide & Cheer powders, there was Arm & Hammer, Surf, Gain, and their house brand Bravo. Plus a Mexican one or two. Didn't have any Downey Advanced at the time, so I went smelling softners. I ended up with the Snuggle with the pale green cap. altho I was sorely tempted to get the suivitel with the baby fresh scent. that one I really did like the best.

 

[Valleyboi]

On the West Coast,I can still find an ample supply of powders but I have noticed it is shrinking. To Toggleswitch, Cheer is no longer Blue,it has been white for many years. Different smell though great on colored clothes and sorry on white clothes. I buy it sometimes when on sale. I use Tide in my white wash, though rinse twice. My KM 70 series washer is a lousey rinser, no spray rinse so I rinse twice sometimes.

 

[geoffdelp]

We still have lots of powder here in Central Minnesota. I still can get it at our local grocers. I went to Sam's Club a few weeks ago and got a HUGE box of Tide; reminded of the old "Family Sized" or "Home Laundry" sized boxes they used to sell. Very tall.

Veg ... you didn't snatch up a box of that Tide? It was still a good product before they switched to Ultra. How much was that?

 

[agiflow]

Valleyboi

"My KM 70 series washer is a lousey rinser, no spray rinse so I rinse twice sometimes."

I never knew there were KM machines that had no spray rinse.Is this a DD machine?

Pat

 

[appnut]

Pat, yep, his is a DD machine just like my Lady K shredmore. No spraty rinse between wach & rinse. One reason why I have to use controlled sudsing detergents. oy.