UK Dishwasher Users: FAIRY Rinse Aid

[rolls_rapide]

I was in Tesco supermarket the other day and spied Procter & Gamble's FAIRY ActiveBursts in a box - you are getting, I think, 50% extra for under 7 pounds Sterling.

What caught my eye was the free bottle of FAIRY Rinse Aid, included in the box!

Now, I don't know about the rest of you, but Fairy rinse aid has always been hard to get in the Tayside area; the last time I saw it must have been 2001 (and defunct Safeway was never cheap!).

Also on the packaging, there is mention of FAIRY Dishwasher Cleaner. I didn't have time to thoroughly scrutinise the details. Has anyone else seen this? (Rob?)

 

[aquarius1984]

yes,

but why would anyone buying FULLY COMPLETE ACTIVE BURSTS want a bottle of rinse aid? Dishwasher cleaner looks ok. Its bigger tablets looking like active bursts. Proctor and Gamble need to go back to their pathetic drawring board and design products for the real world. Like the pathetic claims that Flash cleans in cold water. Wont be moping my floor with cold water. I want it to dry quickly and be grease free. Some stupid bint will buy activebursts and be excited by her useless gift. Note the excessive packaging too for them. Is an Ariel liquitab box really needed? Lmfao

 

[spoodles]

It's not just rinse aid!

It's a bit like the Finish turbo-dry stuff really i.e. a rinse aid that's supposedly for getting plastic stuff perfectly dry etc... It's a brand new product - not the old Fairy stuff that was around years ago.

The Fairy dishwasher cleaner is great - 2 tabs, use 1 a month. It leaves a fantastic scent behind when it's finished. You can get them in Sainsbury's - Tesco, as usual, don't have them yet. They never get new products on time....The offer in Tesco, 50% extra free Active Bursts and a free bottle of drying stuff seems a pretty good deal to me!

I also spotted a new line of Active Bursts in Sainsbury's - called Pure Clean, these are in a blue bag, with blue liquid layer, oh and a new Lenor too - called Oxygen Freshness, it's white and smells OK - it smells of lillies supposedly. There's a new Comfort too - called Comfort Naturals Aloe Vera, priced @ about 30 or 40p more than all the other Comforts and sadly it's a miserable green colour.

Sorry to dawdle off the Fairy topic!

 

[spoodles]

just to add...

*grumbles* About the price of Fairy Active Bursts - I noticed in the US that Cascade with Dawn, Action Pacs (which are the US version of Fairy ABs) are equivalant to about £2.60 for a bag of 20, compared to nearly £7 for a bag of 30 that we have to pay here!

Similarly, bottles of All and Wisk Small & Mighty are (in New York at least) approx £3 and £3.50 respectively for a 32 wash bottle - compare that to £2.88 for Surf and £3.68 for Persil Small & Mighty 20 wash bottles we get over here.

Why do Brits have to pay so much more for our detergents?!

 

[rolls_rapide]

Why do Brits have to pay so much more...

...I was wondering that myself. The cost of branded detergents (everything, from soap powder to toilet cleaner) in the supermarkets is getting beyond a joke. No wonder people try the cheapy supermarkets' stuff.

 

[hoovermatic]

I really like Fairy Active Bursts but would only buy them on special offer as I think they are over priced normally. I have VERY soft water so a pre measured dose like that it strictly speaking, too much. As a result, I use Sainburys own powder so I can control how much I use and I don't think it can be beaten. For sheer outrageous over priced/packaged/hyped/rip off gimmicks, I don't think you need look any further than Finish Quantum. What a crock!!!!

To quote Tom from Gimme, Gimme, Gimme, "What's that all about???"

 

[spoodles]

Lol! Yeah the Finish Quantums are very over-priced and not that great either. The packaging is like something off the Krypton Factor too. I must say about the price of Fairy ABs they are always on some sort of offer, I don't think I've ever paid full price for them.

 

[rolls_rapide]

Rob,

Do you remember a few years ago, Unilever had a product called "SUN All-in-One"?

This was detergent tablets (teardrop shaped) with salt function, and came with a bottle of rinse aid, again with salt function. There was no rinse aid anywhere near the tablets!

My thinking is, that the rinse aid in an Activeburst will virtually all be flushed away by the first rinse, thus resulting in poor drying. Hence the rinse aid.

Hoovermatic, I like them too, but I still use separate rinse aid. My mother tried the "Powder Bursts" version, and complained about the dishes being fragranced. She uses "Finish Classic" tablets normally, but dad came in with the Finish "5-in-1's" recently and she mentioned that the cutlery was "greasy" when she unloaded the machine. I put it down to the combined rinse aid (that in the dispenser, in addition to the powerball thingy.

 

[carlstock]

The only problem we’ve had so far with Active Bursts is that they leave their film behind in the filter. Ho-hum. No good, then, for us! hehe We haven’t used them for quite some time anyway, and they are far too expensive unless on special offer.

But, in any case, we won’t use them because of their failings in terms of leaving part of their film behind. I don’t doubt they may be fine under different conditions – that is, a different machine and cycle perhaps.

Apart from that, CALM DOWN, ROB, for goodness’ sake! LOL You sound like you’re going to explode! I’ll go and get something to calm you down a bit! Here… have a look at this Hoover Turbopower Junior of my great aunt’s that Dad recently fixed… hehe Sorry – forgot to take photos! I can’t help it, y’know – I’m stoooooopid! LOL No, wait… I’m ill! LOL

Take care.

Carl

 

[MrX]

Sun All in One Green Tea and Citrus is on sale 100tabs for the price of 40 at the moment in hydrofilm (self dissolving)

Brilliant results, good price, smells nice, zero damage to anything..

Can't fault it!

Found Fairy AB left my dishes feeling slightly weird - i.e. slightly sticky to touch.

Finish quantum is a total con in my opinion. They're massively over priced and the results are no better than Sun or standard finish products.

Excessive packaging too - total waste.

 

[rolls_rapide]

mrx - (Sun All in One)

Are they still available? The last time I saw Sun "All in One" (with the little bottle of rinse aid) was over 5 years ago, in Semi-Chem shop.

They were good at getting discontinued lines (FAIRY "Tab in Tab", FAIRY powder, FINISH "Anti-bac" rinse aid, GLIST 3in1). They even had VIM scouring powder (though it is no longer made by Lever Bros; and isn't in the old cardboard canister/shaker - it's in a plastic version).

 

[rolls_rapide]

Sun All in One

I just checked Unilever Ireland's site. It appears to be a combination tablet now.

Checking the product data ingredients for SUN tablets, I see that there is a 'Manganese Bleaching Catalyst'. This is probably based on the technology that caused the infamous PERSIL POWER "Accelerator" ingredient to make holes in laundry in the mid 1990's!

 

[aquarius1984]

Sun all in 1

yeah that tablet rinse aid combo was great. Shame it never carried on. i stil occasionally get Sun 3in1s here but only for the price in a cheap shop. Still have my Finish salt and Rinse aid in the machine already when they get used. Quantums are good dont get me wrong. Would not have bought some had work not had the 24packs with 100%extra free. Just at the time we sold them on BOGOF! Plus discount made sense. Still using them now. Got 8 packs in total. They clean the same as Finish Classic so wont buy them full price. Fairy has very little cleaning power compared to Finish. Greasy pans and tea stains left in the cups even after my Hotpoints 70deg Intensive wash - Finish does all this on 50deg Economy wash. Currently on Finish Turbo Dry Rinse Aid cos we seem to be using lots of plastic storage tubs of late and it shows. It does the trick. Just dont get why Fairy has the rinse aid in the stupidly priced"All in 1 tabs yet you also need to fork out 3quid for the rinse age too to dry plastic. Sticking with Finish thanks. Rob

 

[carlstock]

Got to agree regarding the Fairy Active Bursts having Fairy rinse aid sold with them! hehe That does not quite make sense, but then no combination tablet really makes sense to me because one almost always needs separate salt and rinse aid anyway, even in soft water areas!

Quite simply, all dishwashers need to have separate salt in them, and that also applies if the water softener in the machine is set to minimum – that is, for a soft water area. In this case, only a small amount of salt will be used. However, as always, it’s important to check with one’s local water supplier to see what the *actual* water hardness is at each address – it can vary! We’ve done this in our area and set the new Miele dishwasher appropriately. Just look at a water bill, go to your supplier’s website and see if you can find any link that mentions water hardness, fluoride levels quality, etc.

The link shows an example for my area, though they’ve misspelt my town’s name – grrrrrr! LOL Crumbs – if it’s not “Bishop Stortford”, the apostrophe gets left out! LOL It’s “Bishop’s Stortford”!!!

Anyway, where was I? hehe We always use salt and rinse aid, although some combination detergents may require a slight reduction in the amount of separate rinse aid added to the final rinse. However, this is not always the case, which begs the question: “Is there actually any rinse aid in some combination detergents?!” LOL

We’ve had to change a lot of products in this house over the years due to my sensitivity to chemicals and perfume, and I’m afraid we’ve had to do the same with laundry and dishwasher detergents, so I can’t use Finish, even though the perfume used is limonene (basically made from citrus fruits with a bit of chemistry involved). All of the stuff we use now is perfume-free because it simply has to be. A shame because Finish Classic – we would use all-Finish products in our machines – are the best in our experience, though it can of course vary depending on one’s load (the type of dishes and the types of food) and dishwasher. Also, *sniff* no more Persil. *cries eyes out uncontrollably*

Still, I still have my Mieles! hehe

Oh, and my Miele dishwasher is sooooooooo quiet – it’s amazing! I’m hyper-sensitive to sound, and even I don’t realise it’s on at times – a real godsend! Which? tested dishwashers a little while back, and this one came back as the quietest slimline on test. However, I do quite miss the AEG we had, which was nice, but rattled terribly – most likely a sort-of DOA/‘Friday afternoon’ one.

Carl

http://www.threevalleyswater.co.uk/home/water-composition/result.php?postcode=CM23+5LW

 

[rolls_rapide]

I had a look at Scottish Water's site and it's bloody useless - as usual! No mention of water hardness, but pdf fact sheets about black mould, pink mould, manganese, chlorine, etc.

A search with Google intimated that Strathclyde and Central Scotland may have consistently soft water; other Scottish region may have variable (soft - moderate).

I quite agree about modern detergents and their perfumes - what IS that all about??? As we are supposedly becoming more allergic to substances, food ingredients, etc, surely it makes sense to minimise allergenic ingredients? Maybe it's too simple for the manufacturers to comprehend!!!

 

[MrX]

Sun All in 1

Sun All-in-1 and the new versions are no longer marketed in the UK. It seems that Unilever gave up on the dishwasher market there.

It's still marketed in Ireland because it's a very dominant and successful brand, in the UK finish seems to have wiped everything else out!

The packs sold here are printed up for Belgium, Netherlands, France, Switzerland, Germany, Portugal and Ireland and have Pyrex and Royal Leerdam recommendations on the box.

Also, because the Republic of Ireland uses the Euro (€) it often now makes more financial sense for distributers here to source products in the Eurozone and not in the UK as they're basically not really imports and have no currency conversion costs to worry about. This is also partially why there are slightly different formulations of Persil and a number of other brands.

The Republic of Ireland also has tighter requirements on phosphate usage too. So, Persil tablets for example are a different formula here (i.e. without phosphates) while they still contain phosphates in the UK.

The Green Party are the minor coalition partner in Government here at the moment.

Also, I can see tablet washing powder taking a serious nose dive in sales here soon too. They're extending our 22cent per bag plastic bag levy to excessively wasteful packaging so, the tabletised washing powders will be hit with a 22 cent levy charged and itemised on your receipt and possibly labeled on the box too!

It hits a range of items including unnecessarily pre-packed trays of fruit, washing powder tablets..

Disolvable tablet coverings may escape though so Sun All in 1 and Finish Quantum may escape the wrath of the environmentalists, but the cheaper stuff in little plastic packs will be taxed.

 

[spoodles]

Quote: "I quite agree about modern detergents and their perfumes - what IS that all about??? As we are supposedly becoming more allergic to substances, food ingredients, etc, surely it makes sense to minimise allergenic ingredients? Maybe it's too simple for the manufacturers to comprehend!!!"

My guess is so they can sell their "gentle" non-bios and fabric softeners and market them as "pure" (lol) and people will lap them up.