No fear
I was dead-set against HE washers, so I bought a SQ TL, and I do love it. But I rarely use it now. As a late middle age crisis thing, I bought the matching SQ FL as a kind of play toy, expecting to not like it and re-sell it. Much to my surprise, I found that it gets my clothes cleaner than the TL. The detergent and water savings are phenomenal. Generally a couple tablespoons, maybe 3 for a huge heavily soiled load in hard water, is the maximum detergent.
It takes a little time and patience to get through a learning curve on loading it and dosing detergent. But you'll never turn back.
I have a crack pot theory that the people who complain about their front loaders not getting clothes clean are overloading it, and/or using too much detergent.
The idea is to fill the drum full with clothes, but loosely, not packed, so that once they're all wet, they all rise and drop onto the drum in an ellipse, without any garments being caught in the middle doing nothing but going around and around in place. The washing action is more effective than a TL. When the soaking wet garment drops down onto the drum, it forces soapy water through it, just like the ancient practice of slapping sopping wet garments on a smooth stone. But if it's overloaded, the garments don't fall so there's no washing action, and if there are too many suds, that cushions the fall and also inhibits the flow of water through the garments, so the load does not get clean.
But the bottom line is that although at first it looks like there's no water in there, once you get the hang of it, there's better washing action than a TL with less wear on your clothes.
