warm rinse

Automatic Washer - The world's coolest Washing Machines, Dryers and Dishwashers

Help Support :

roscoe62

Well-known member
Joined
Dec 9, 2010
Messages
327
Location
Canada
For those who use warm rinse in the winter when do you or do you change to cold in the summer, especially for towels.
 
Hi Gary

I started to use warm rinse in the winter with towels and found they rinsed better with no suds lock problems.With summer approaching the cold water is not like ice in the winter, I guess it depends on where you live and how early spring gets started to warm up reservoirs over the summer.
 
We usually switch from warm to cold rinses starting in mid to late May.  By mid November it's back to warm again for the winter.
 
Ah I see now...you aren't really switching to rinse in cold water....it is the cold water that has warmed up so you can select the cold option. For me my water stays the same temperature year round as I am on a well system so the water is always cold.
 
I always use warm rinses when I have the option...

...as you might guess, lol.

The main thing is that oil-based dirt needs warm water to liquefy. If cold rinses are used, it re-solidifies and gets deposited..... oh! back on the clothes.

Several times over the years I've compared warm vs cold rinses by immediately running a second warm wash in a load following a warm rinse and comparing the same with a cold rinse load. The wash water from the warm rinse load ALWAYS is cloudy and has fewer suds.
 
Hot and or Warm Water Rinsing

Via washing machines especially semi or fully automatics was a holdover from days when pure soaps were the only "detergent" for laundry purposes. When using that substance for a whole variety of reasons the first, second and even third rinses should be hot or at least warm.

Advances in detergents however mean if properly dosed and used soils and oils should rinse away freely regardless of water temperature. Suppose of you have water that is near freezing or at least *very* cold that could be another matter.

When the energy crisis of the 1970's hit it became the death knell for warm water rinses as washing machine makers began to phase out that option on consumer washers. It is also the period we began hearing more from *them that should know* that cold water was just as effective for rinsing as hot or warm....

Being as all this may commercial laundries then and now often rinse in hot or warm water for their own reasons. Supposedly warm water is easier to extract thus leaving the finished product "drier" than when rinsed in cold. Keep in mind commercial machines can go through several rinses one of which could be a LCB cycle. The final rinse after all those hot or warm ones could be cold but things are still going to be very warm after the final spin. If I allow my vintage Miele to rinse in hot or warm water even with a final cold rinse (the fifth in series) laundry is still warm as it comes out of the machine.

The other supposed benefit of rinsing in warm water is that it makes less work for tumble driers. Again theory is the machine does not have to use energy to heat "cold" laundry. Consumer Reports and other groups debunk this by saying the small amount of energy needed to bring "cold" laundry up to temperature is still less than using hot or warm water for rinsing. Choose which side you want to believe....

Drawback of using hot and or warm water for rinsing is certain chemicals/substances will continue to work and not benefit from the deactivation that comes from cold water. Enzymes, oxygen bleaches, those sort of things.

Much of the lore surrounding hot or warm rinses in American domestic laundry situations revolves around the dominant type of washing machine; a top loader with a central beater. Such machines have long had only one rinse (though some did offer the option for a second). As such you really have only one shot (plus perhaps a few more if the machine has spray rinses) to get all the soap/detergent/soil etc... out of laundry.

Finally the other worry comes from spin drying hot or even warm laundry can produce creases. These lines may or may not come out during tumble drying. They certainly would increase the work of anyone doing hand ironing so can see why many would choose to avoid the extra work.
 
Given the corruption and incestuous whoredom, for there is the exchange of money involved, between the Department of Energy, utility companies, detergent manufacturers and appliance manufacturers, I choose to trust my own feelings about rinsing in cool water instead of cold over anything the above referenced parties say because, as the Native Americans used to say in TV shows, they speak with forked tongues. Anytime the power company tells customers to hang laundry to dry instead of using a dryer, they have lost all credibility with me.

I used to wash Permapress clothing in my WCI58 which spun at 1140 and it dried flawlessly in the Filtrator.
 
Drawback of using hot and or warm water for rinsing is certain chemicals/substances will continue to work and not benefit from the deactivation that comes from cold water. Enzymes, oxygen bleaches, those sort of things.

Honestly, I don't think that Enzymes, oxygen bleaches, detergents, etc. really care if the rinse water is 70F or 110F. At that point water is water.

I can rinse say a load of cotton shirts in cold water the rinse water will be perfectly clear. If I rinse again using warm water, I'll get some suds in the rinse water. Why is that?
 
>The other supposed benefit of rinsing in warm water is that it makes less work for tumble driers. Again theory is the machine does not have to use energy to heat "cold" laundry. Consumer Reports and other groups debunk this by saying the small amount of energy needed to bring "cold" laundry up to temperature is still less than using hot or warm water for rinsing.

I don't know exactly what CR says. That said, it seems to me that making a general one-size-fits-all pronouncement may or may not apply to a given person/situation. How much hot water gets used in the rinse? Is this a large GE Filter-Flo? Or a front loader that uses less water? Also is the water heated using the same energy source as the dryer? If hot water costs less to heat than run the dryer, using warmer water in the rinse might cut drying costs. And it seems to me (although I may be wrong) that if damp laundry is "warm damp" not "tap cold water cold" damp then it might dry faster on a line. If so, that might make line drying more viable for a longer period of the year.
 
>I can rinse say a load of cotton shirts in cold water the rinse water will be perfectly clear. If I rinse again using warm water, I'll get some suds in the rinse water. Why is that?

An evil demon comes and sprinkles some detergent into the rinse water when your back is turned.
 
@tomturbomatic

Agreed. More generally, anytime some big entity (gov't, company, whatever) announces that A is better than B but is vague as to how and why I'm immediately suspicious.

@lordkenmore

Exactly. There are so many variables in each individual situation that CR (or whoever) must either address them or explain why they are irrelevant. A failure to do either is a major red flag.

I did a quick google search and the first link I found to give a number is attached below. The melting point of sebum (96F) is given as background information. Assuming the number is correct, how does a rinse temperature below that not cause the oil to solidify and thereby increase the likelihood of being trapped in clothing?

Jim



http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4000317.html
 
"Honestly, I don't think that Enzymes, oxygen bleaches, detergents, etc. really care if the rinse water is 70F or 110F. At that point water is water. "

Well no, not exactly.

If you want to begin the process of deactivation then water is not "just water".

Both enzymes and bleaches have thresholds at which they will either stop working and or become more aggressive.

Enzymes at first had a sweet spot starting around 98F (body temperature) to 120F or even 140F. Now we have "cold water" detergents with enzymes developed for temps as low as 85F. Though apparently absent in great numbers elsewhere there does exist a sizable population of the UK that believes enzymes survive the laundering process and can irritate skin.

Bleaches:

All bleaches (chlorine, oxygen, oxalic acid, etc...) become more aggressive with each ten degree increase in temperature.

Chlorine bleach has an affinity for cotton and linen fibers and thus is very difficult to rinse (hence commercial laundries use anti-chlors), but will work in cold water.

Oxygen bleaches vary from having weak, slow to nonexistent in cool or cold water (liquid hydrogen peroxide, sodium perborate). Sodium percarbonate will bleach at lower water temps but the process takes longer, not as long as with the other oxygen bleaches, but still longer.

Point of all this palaver is simple; rinsing is a process of dilution and until that process removes most or all chemicals applied during the wash there will be a carry over into rinse or rinses.
 
But if warmer water opens the weave of fabrics and relaxes them, making them more flexible so that they move better in the water so that water flows through the fabrics better, then quicker, more thorough rinsing would seem to be effected in water tempered to around room temperature rather than in water in the 40-50F range. The experiences reported of a second warm rinse removing washing products left behind after a preliminary cold rinse would point to this, although a single rinse is usually only adequate for saving water and time.
 
>I did a quick google search and the first link I found to give a number is attached below. The melting point of sebum (96F) is given as background information. Assuming the number is correct, how does a rinse temperature below that not cause the oil to solidify and thereby increase the likelihood of being trapped in clothing?

I have to assume that the cold water would cause it to solidify. However...one advantage is that it should have been liquefied, and mixed with the wash water. Most of that wash water drained. So whatever remains should be vastly diluted. Vastly diluted is not the same as "all gone," of course. Although one is miles ahead of those who listen to the "experts" talk about how great cold water washes are.

Which reminds me: my high school physics teacher defined expert this way:
ex = has been
spurt = drip under pressure.
 
In defense of rinse water less than 96F, I would have to say that once the fats have been emulsified by a sufficient amount of good detergent and water at temps over 96F, they are more likely to be able to be rinsed away at temps slightly below that, but I have my doubts at how well the rinsing would go at painfully cold temperatures.

Modern detergents might do this at lower temperatures with magical enzymes.
 
>Modern detergents might do this at lower temperatures with magical enzymes.

Or other magical ingredients. Of course, those magical ingredients might magically cause various other problems. I have heard a number of complaints about skin irritation after using Cold Water Tide. Not everyone has issues, of course, but the fact that some people do have issues points to the thought that maybe ramming cold water only washes down our collective throats may have unintended problems for some people.
 
People with sensitive skin have had irritations from laundry soaps and detergents from their advent. I remember showing my mother an early TIDE ad from the late 40s or early 50s where it said that you could skip rinsing if you wished. I asked her about it and she tersely said that it did not work out. For women using a wringer washer, to be able to skip rinsing was a BFD, as Joe Biden would say.
 
you have to see the ironic humor in people who wash totally in cold water.....and for instance use the PermPress/Casual cycle in cold water only, start to finish........the whole process is the minimize wrinkling and care of those fabrics...Hot or Warm wash must be used to clean as well as cause the fabric to flex easily, then the gentle cool down, note, not a polar plunge into cold water.....but by the second to third rinse, the fabric is relaxed, and any creases from wearing are removed....and a slower spin as to extract, yet not compact the clothes to add more wrinkles.....

how is this process achieved with an all COLD cycle?.....

using a dryer is one thing with a cold rinse, but have found when it comes to line drying, warm rinses work better.....fabrics are softer and seem to dry faster....

if line drying after a cold rinse, it seems like folding cardboard, and drying one self off with sand paper....

there has to be something to all of this, because I do find it best for line drying to place the load in the dryer, after a cold rinse, for about 10 minutes to warm them up, and then hang on the line, same results as if I machine dried....

FLers don't seem to have a big deal of having a warm rinse, its only a few gallons of hot water used.......but a lot of the regular TLers of the past ten years have you fooled, you can select a warm rinse, but the deep rinse is not warm, that's a cold fill, its the sprays during the final spin that are actually warm...and most people don't realize it.....
 
>a lot of the regular TLers of the past ten years have you fooled, you can select a warm rinse, but the deep rinse is not warm, that's a cold fill, its the sprays during the final spin that are actually warm...and most people don't realize it.....

Not too terribly surprising. After all, they dumb down wash temperatures, so why not rinse temperatures as well?
 
Back
Top