Putting dish soap in a washing machine

[niclonnic]

This may sound unorthodox, but have you tried using liquid dish soap in a washing machine intended for laundry?

It is something that I have been experimenting with. I work as a dishwasher at a 55+ country club's restaurant close to my home. In this line of work, my chef coat and aprons naturally tend to get splattered with food and grease stains. So, every time I do laundry, I separate my work clothes from my regular ones, load the former items into my GE front-loader, turn off SmartDispense, and pour anywhere between a teaspoon and tablespoon of AJAX dish soap into the detergent compartment. I then run the machine on "quick wash" with hot water. This process essentially pretreats the food and grease before I wash these items with my other laundry.

The big question is, does dish soap create excessive suds in the washer? Surprisingly, it doesn't. Despite this soap being highly concentrated, it doesn't produce nearly as many suds as I would have hoped to see. And so far, this has caused NO harm to my machine whatsoever.

So, is dish soap a good pretreater for post-foodservice laundry? If so, has it caused any damage to your washing machine over time?

 

[combo52]

Can’t imagine that it would hurt anything

My only concern is a teaspoon of detergent is too little to use in a machine unless you have incredibly soft water, you risk ruining the main seal of the washer if you use too little detergent in any washer.

I think it’s still a good idea to use regular detergent for the full wash cycle, as hand dish dishwashing detergent do not have agents that help protect the machine.

John L

 

[d-todd]

I suppose that dish soap would have certain benefits to getting out some foodservice stains, but washing machine detergent is engineered for fabrics. That is my take.

Combo52, can you explain how using too little or wrong detergent impacts washer seals? And how would you know if you put in enough? I use a 1/4 cup of powdered Arm & Hammer in my TC5 and it seems to get the clothing clean.

 

[DADoES]

 
I wouldn't expect such products to be suitable as the primary detergent for a clothes washing machine, or a whole-load pretreatment.  The volume of water in a washing machine (even a frontloader) is larger than dishwashing in a sink so a proportionately larger dosage is required to condition it, which would generate more suds than you're seeing on those scant doses.

It can be suitable for spot-treating, which is an entirely different thing.

 

[launderess]

What you want is called *Laundry Emulsifier*. Commercial, professional and institution use such chemicals to remove oil and grease from cotton and polyester cotton blend textiles. Emulsifiers are used in conjunction with detergents in wash or pre-wash to cope with laundry that is moderately to heavily soiled with oils, grease and fats. High pH and water temps will do almost same thing, but chemicals such as emulsifiers will get you there more efficiently and effectively.

https://catalog.alco-chem.com/p/0284-5/Alco-Laundry-Presoak-Emulsifier-5-Gal-Pail/

Manual dishwashing detergents contain good amounts of emulsifiers which is why Dawn liquid is often used to wash oil soaked water fowl, they present issues when used in automatic washing machines for textiles.

There is a product sold for domestic use call Disol-vol which is a laundry emulsifier, but based more on pH than surfactants as it contains good amounts of washing soda and sodium metasilicate. I'd recommend adding some white vinegar or other sour product in final rinse to cope with crunchy or hard wash afterwards.

VEND1013-1-Main-VEND1013_PARENT.jpgVEND1013-2-Alternate-0.jpg
Disol-vol Laundry Detergent Booster

Grease Relief is still out there:
https://malcopro.com/products/greas...AJNTRV0sTcbB00z8UPdO6_g2UJJE0j5qKPbnQ8OVLdrzz



Then there is the old standby, household ammonia:

https://www.automaticwasher.org/cgi-bin/TD/TD-VIEWTHREAD.cgi?59773

https://www.housedigest.com/1577268/expert-use-ammonia-in-laundry-good-or-bad-idea/

Lestoil is another old standby:

https://www.amazon.com/CLEANR-LESTOIL-MfrPartNo-33910-Lestoil/dp/B01N313HWK

 

[askolover]

I keep a spray bottle with diluted dawn dishwashing liquid in my laundry cupboard to spray in grease spots that get in my clothes. If that doesn't, lestoil usually will.

 

[combo52]

Washer main seal damage from two little detergent

If you have harder water, especially if you’re using a cheap powder detergent like arm and hammer, it will leave a mineral buildup on things, including around the seal and the mineral buildup is fairly abrasive. It can actually destroy the seal.

Using two little liquid detergent and to cool wash water temperatures also can leave a gunky buildup all around shafts and seals, etc. which keeps the area moist and accelerates corrosion and problems.

We see this type of damage all the time on washing machines where they have bearing failures because the seals were destroyed and moisture gets in the bearings, because we’re normally working in the home fixing things we see how they were used know the water conditions, etc.

This is why some machines last decades without seal and bearing failures and other machines can fail and just a couple years we’ve seen quite a few Speed Queen top loaders fail where people have hard water and use two little detergent and then it’s especially bad if they give them a second rinse because there’s nothing in the water to lubricate it anymore.

John L

 

[hoover1100]

Dish soap on grease stains

I find it works better than any proprietary pre-treater on grease stains, however I haven't tried putting it in the machine, I dab a bit directly onto the stain, rub it in, leave it a couple of minutes then wash as normal.

Matt

 

[mark_wpduet]

wouldn't that be like washing laundry with pre-treater?

I ran across a video on YouTube not long ago but I can't find it. I can't remember the title to search for it in my history... something like "This is what I do to save money. I haven't bought laundry detergent in YEARS he said. He was using what looked like a direct drive whirlpool TL

He uses dawn liquid to wash clothes. He demonstrated doing it in his TL washer. he used like 1/2 cup of that stuff. He said, "I know what you're thinking, there's going to be too much soap" But there wasn't...

I replied to him and asked him "How is this saving money?"

I too use it only for food oil stains in a spray bottle with water..

I mean, does dish liquid do well with body oils? I dunno. But to me that was totally dumb because it's not saving money at all.

 

[maytaga806]

When I have grease stains or body oil stains on anything I add a drizzle of dawn in addition to the tide. Really helps to cut that grease and or oil more than detergent will alone and I also pretreat with dawn. I use the bleach alternative lemon dawn but any will work. I don’t use too much cause the sudsing is ridiculous in my Kenmore direct drive.

 

[nashmaytagbear]

I keep dawn dishwashing liquid in the spray bottle to pretreat stains it works pretty well.

 

[gelaundry4ever]

dishwasher detergent

What about trying dishwasher detergent in the washer? How would that deal with grease stains?

 

[me]

I'd have thought dishwasher detergent would be a bit harsh on fabric.

I used to know the mechanic in charge of the garage for a local holiday park, he'd get his wife to wash his overalls with Swarfega to get the grease out.

 

[askolover]

Waaaay back in the day when we nurses had to wear the white uniforms we would occasionally use cascade or some dishwasher detergent in the load to keep them white. But that was when the powders were all chlorine based.