"Vintage Calgonite"

[kenmore71]

Over in the Imperial forum mention was made recently of the ORIGINAL Calgonite as being the recommended detergent in the early electric sinks. After doing a little research, all I seem to be able to find was that it was originally developed and manufactured by Hagan Chemical and that it appears to have been introduced in the early 1940s. Is this correct?

What was in the original Calgonite? I would imagine it had a healthy dose of phosphates as well as chlorine bleach. There was another mention made somewhere that it would actually burn your hands. Did it have lye in it instead of bleach? This child of the 70s is curious....

 

[toploader55]

DishMachine Detergents of My Memory

I remember as a child born in 1955, we got a first dishwasher in 1962.

Our GE Princess had recommended Calgonite, Cascade, Dishwasher All, Electrasol,and Finish

There might have been one more, but I think I remember either these brands in the Owner's Manual or on a supplement or tag from the machine.

I remember reading there was some kind of Silicate ? for lubrication and protection for the pump, seals and gaskets.

 

[dirtybuck]

OK...I've seen the occasional POTD ads for Cascade when it was a "new" product.

BUT was there another product on the market before Cascade was introduced? If so, what was it?

(I tried doing a search and came up with nothing, but there was a link to "dishwasher" on wikipedia that had some very interesting facts, and even has a short 6 second video of a unloaded dishwasher in action)

 

[arbilab]

I think you'd find that all powder detergents will give you an alkali burn if held in your hand and wet. I rinse my hands after dispensing Tide. God forbid you should forget and rub your eyes with that stuff on your hands.

 

[tomturbomatic]

Very often the dishwasher dealers sold Calgonite back in the 40s and into the early 50s before it was attractive enough a product for all grocery stores to sell. It was recommended by Sunbean for cloth filter maintenance also.

 

[jamiel]

at that point probably just alkali and phosphates. Don't think chlorine was stabilized in powders until the 50s (Cascade's Chlorosheen was di-iso-cyanurate or something with that...think pool chlorine). Also didn't have much in the way of surfactants (remember Dreft was pre-war, sudsy and mild---Tide wasn't until after the war. My grandfather worked on detergent chemistry at Monsanto in 1946-1947...my grandmother told of him bringing home samples which worked wonderfully but smelled atrocious...it was apparently a bit of a parlor game for him after dinner to take the guests into the kitchen and demonstrate the wonders of...detergent.

 

[abcomatic]

As I remember it in the 60's, the box was silver colored and had blue writing on it with a few rain drops. Gary

 

[tomturbomatic]

silver foil box with raindrops

That was Calgon (sodium hexametaphosphate). Calgonite was the dishwahser detergent.

 

[peteski50]

calgonite!

I miss calgonite - I thought it was a real great detergent!
PPeter

 

[kqkenmore]

dirtybuck

You are right there was another dishwasher detergent before Cascade and it was Electrasol the first dishwasher detergent.The GE repairman that sold us our first used dishwasher told us to use either Cascade or Electrasol what ever was the cheapest I always wanted Cascade because it had a better scent and did not spot the glasses  Electrasol smelled like rotten eggs and left spots. 

 

[kenmore71]

So, at this point no one here actually knows for sure what was in the original Calgonite?
Anyone?

 

[stan]

Hi Mark

Calgonite was a water conditioner for automatic dishwashers ( 1 tsp ) to be added along with the detergent.
It was made by the same Co that made Calgon, Calgnite only for dishwashers.
If you click on fourm topics section then scroll down to the bottom, you'l find "Calgonite" click that and you'l see a photo of an old can of it, If your able to zoom in, you will also be able to read "direction for use"
Hope this answers your question.

 

[rolls_rapide]

Old dishwasher detergent

The old formula detergents were very caustic, being composed of Sodium Metasilicate and Sodium Dichloroisocyanurate. The international safety label displays a hand and a surface being corroded.

Sodium Metasilicate is strongly alkaline, just under 12 on the pH scale.

Sodium Dichloroisocyanurate is a powerful, quick acting, chlorine based bleaching agent.

Typical ingredients of professional/commercial grade detergents for commercial, short cycle machines.

Chlorine bleaches have been linked to damaging aquatic life and formation of dioxins in the environment.

There have also been cases, apparently, of people being poisoned by strong dishwasher detergents.

The domestic detergents have been reformulated to make them safer, more effective at lower temperatures, less aggressive on some metals, and easier to measure/dispense by the user.

 

[kenmore71]

Thanks for the detailed responses. I did pretty well in chemistry back in the day and the exact chemical compounds involved were what I was interested in!

 

[launderess]

Hagen Corporation & Subsidiaries

Owned Calgon Corp, which produced the product of same marketed since the early 1930's as water softener and limescale remover amoung other things.

Calgonite was originally marketed as a product sold to industrial/commercial kitchens that controlled water hardness during dishwashing so items rinsed cleaner and thus were more hygenic. Theory behind this was that hard water deposits from using soap (the common cleaner of the day) based products left scum that attracted and supported germ growth. Rinsing cleaner dishware supposedly left no place for such flith to hide. Since mechanical dishwashing machines had been in commercial use by the early 1900's and later domestic use when soap was still the dominate cleaner in the home, one can only guess that this early Calgonite *may* have been a rinse agent since adverts one has seen make no mention of cleaning abilities.

Not sure when Calgonite dishwasher detergent came along, but long story short Calgon, Inc. was sold off to Merck in the 1960's and later broken up and sold again to Reckitt-Benckiser. See link for the contents of the last recent incarnation of Calgonite automatic dishwasher powder. Have no idea what the original formula contained but probably was quite similar minus a few modern ingredients.

[this post was last edited: 3/18/2012-07:45]

Reckitt Ingredients & Product Information

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www.rbnainfo.com

 

[launderess]

Automatic Dishwasher Detergent

Are by nature highly caustic/alkaline. Some older and perhaps modern formulas more than others. Base chemicals (sodium carbonate and so forth) combine with fats and oils to become a type of soap that can be flushed away. This is one of the reasons drain openers are made from lye and caustic substances. Of course as anyone who has made soap knows lye + fats ='s soap.

Chlorine bleaches bring several other functions to the party. First they kill act as a disinfectant leaving dishware sanitary. Chlorine bleaches also attack protein which helps with breaking down foods such as egg, milk, and so forth. Finally the stuff removes stains such as coffee, tea, wine and so forth.

While not perfect chlorine and strong or strongly base dw detergents can or did give good results. Especially when housewives/commercial kitchens followed the old rules of scrapping plates very well and or washing/rinsing them before being loaded into the machine. This coupled with near boiling water temperatures along with water power that often could blow paint off a bridge did the trick.

However being as this may not all dishes would come clean, especially those laden with protein soils and or had been allowed to sit for too long. So we have the arrival of enzyme products which Consumer Reports at once reported were streets ahead of the old formulas. Enzymes also allowed dw detergents to drop chlorine bleach (it would kill off the enzymes) much to many housewives (us included) joy as they hated the wafting scent of bleach as their machines were running. Remember the early commercials for Cascade products with enzymes showing housewives making all sorts of faces and waving hands about over the fumes coming out of their machines with the 'old" stuff.

Enzymes also allowed for lower temperature of wash water and some could would argue the need for power enough to sand blast dishes clean.

OTHO just as with laundry enzymes take time to work properly, so wash cycles were perhaps lengthened on some machines.

 

[rolls_rapide]

Lengthening of wash cycles

The old machines that my mum had back in the 80s and 90s, typically took between 75 to 90 minutes to complete a full load on the intensive cycles.

Nowadays, the same cycles take two hours plus.

Remember too, that the modern machines use so little water, that they have to spend time switching the water flow to different spray arms. And the motor slows/stops too, to allow the diverter valve to flip over.

 

[bajaespuma]

Vintage Calgonite came as a sample inside our 2nd GE dishwasher, and, just as intended, for that machine she used nothing but..

 

[launderess]

Calgon

Held patents in both the United States and Canada, much of them having to do with the production and what not of various phosphates. When you read some of the patents you get an idea of how much money there was to be made with phosphates. From household cleaning to dairy production, the stuff was everywhere.

Consider also until displaced by other methods, steam (via boilers) powered much of industry not only in the North American but elsewhere in the industrialised world.

Steam powered locomotives, ships, boats, heavy equipment, steam heating, and so forth. However when one uses water of various qualities you are going to have the potential for limescale and thus the need for some sort of water softening agent. Railroads alone must have consumed tons of the stuff.

Of course as electric,diesel and other means of power, heating, etc.. took over there was a reduced need for water softening chemicals. While reduced the demand is still there as phosphates are added to foods and still widely used for various other commercial/industrial uses.

Finally in case no one has noticed, recent incarnations of the dishwaher product are spelled "Calgonit" not "Calgonite", at least not in the United States.