Vintage Detergents

[tennblondie78]

I have seen many of you mention before that you are using vintage detergents. Where do you have the best luck finding them? I would love to try some, and the boxes would make wonderful decorations for my laundry room once empty.

 

[supersuds]

Estate sales, and eBay.

If you want empty boxes I can help out. I've been throwing them away.

 

[tennblondie78]

Oh My!!!

Yes, Supersuds, I would love some vintage boxes! Thank you!

 

[tennblondie78]

Could you give me some tips on which brands are the best to actually use? I know some of them absorb moisture badly and degrade over time. I would really like to actually use what I buy.

 

[supersuds]

Well, first of all, ask the seller if the detergent appears to be hardened (if it isn't mentioned in the description). Look at the pictures to see if the box looks like it is bulging badly. Some bending is to be expected in something that old, but the box shouldn't look like it's about to burst.

The box shouldn't have water stains on it...some of the stuff looks like it's been in a flood.

Generally, concentrated detergents such as All, Dash, and AD (a short-lived Colgate brand) seem to have the most problems with hardening. I don't know whether this is because the surfactants were different or if the "fillers" in the un-concentrated brands help them to be freer-flowing.

If the detergent is from the phosphate-era, which is almost anything before 1970, I've had fairly good luck, even with All (though not so much with Dash!) After 1970 or so, some states restricted phosphorus content, but in much of the country, phosphate formulations were still on the market. If you can determine from pictures whether it has phosphates or not that helps. I've found that non-phosphate detergents get hardened much more readily, probably because they use sodium carbonate.

I've found dirty, faded boxes that are full of perfectly usable product, and minty-clean boxes that are hard as a rock.

Hope that helps!

 

[tennblondie78]

Thanks!

You have been a load of help. Do you use vintage detergents because you find they clean better than modern ones or do you just enjoy using them due to the vintage aspect? I suspect it may be a bit of both along with a sort of scientific experiment to see if they are still effective...

 

[launderess]

Vintage All (with bleach, borax and brighteners) is the one product in my stash that is free flowing and pretty much as good as the day it was made back in the 1970's. OTOH Burst, Dash, and a few others are hot messes of clumping and hardening. So much so one (Burst) is regulated to "rag" washing, and the Dash may be sold off to someone for display purposes.

Find in general detergents with high phosphate content are prone to clumping. This probably has something to do with that substance having a "love" for moisture IIRC. This is one of the reasons IIRC powdered dishwasher detergent (formerly loaded with phosphates) containers were foil wrapped boxes and or other methods of keeping out moisture. It is also why you shouldn't keep such products in warm/moist environments such as under the kitchen sink.

 

[supersuds]

Stephanie, I just use them for fun. It's an indulgence -- some people go to Vegas, I use old detergent!

You're onto something when you say it's part experiment. That has turned out to be fun. Some brands are clearly better than others. Tide deserved its market leadership -- as long as high suds are not a problem with your washing machine!

Cold Power has been excellent, and produces lower suds than Tide. I think Colgate was putting its best technology into Cold Power in the Sixties because works much better than another of their brands, Punch. Rinso, a Lever bargain brand by the Sixties, performs like a bargain brand -- it will do but there were better choices.

Biggest disappointment has been Salvo, the low-sudsing P&G tablet. You need hot water to make sure they dissolve. hHd one go through a warm wash AND rinse and barely lose 50% of its volume! Even fully dissolved it would not completely get simple food stains off white shirts. For Tide, those kinds of stains are a snap.

I do think that old detergents with phosphates produce whiter whites, but for other laundry new detergents are just fine.

 

[supersuds]

Launderess, my "score" on All has been three boxes hardened, three free-flowing. Maybe just bad luck? When it's good, it's very very good.

The problem I've had with non-phosphate detergents clumping goes back a long time. I can get a box of current production Tide and it will get hard, after opening, in a few months. That historically didn't happen when I started doing laundry with phosphate detergent in the Eighties, and it doesn't seem to be happening to the vintage detergents I have now (leaving out the ones that were hard when acquired).

I would agree about old dishwasher detergents. Those things would turn into a lump in a hurry -- Tomturbomatic mentioned once that he thought it was because they used sodium hexametaphosphate, which is more hygroscopic than STPP.

http://www.automaticwasher.org/cgi-bin/TD/TD-VIEWTHREAD.cgi?45383

 

[gorenje]

@ Supersuds

Hi John, sorry if I'm intruding, is you email on your profile valid? I would like to ask you something in private.

Thank you

Ingemar

 

[launderess]

Only Problem One Has With Vintage All Powder

Is that the "Three Bs" version tends to give textiles a bluish cast. It also if not dissolved properly will leave blue splotches and marks. Had to soak/rewash a few loads of white bed linens that had such marks after using All. The elastic waistbands of certain white undergarments have also turned "blue" from using All as well.