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Thread Number: 68769
/ Tag: Detergents and Additives
A different homemade detergent. |
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| Post# 916305 , Reply# 4 1/18/2017 at 23:19 (2,644 days old) by gosvenn (Montreal) | ||
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Thanks for sharing the information, it was very useful. | ||
Post# 916340 , Reply# 5 1/19/2017 at 09:14 (2,644 days old) by Tomturbomatic  (Beltsville, MD) |
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We are here to help each other. Enjoy your washing! | ||
| Post# 921163 , Reply# 8 2/13/2017 at 16:44 (2,618 days old) by Iheartmaytag (Wichita, Kansas) | ||
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Post# 921201 , Reply# 10 2/13/2017 at 21:51 (2,618 days old) by panthera (Rocky Mountains) |
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Oh, gosh, this is fun! OK - the only way home made detergents have ever worked is what we call in German: Das Baukastensystem. Here's what we need to do: 1) Basic detergent - that would be dry or wet chemicals which can be stored for along period of time. The surfactant, mainly. Soap is ideal for this. 2) The STTP or TSP (and, yes, I know, I know, but guess what 99% of that super-duper-expensive STP really is you've had on your laundry room shelf and been bragging about how much better it is than TSP? Yup, it's TSP after a very short time. 3) Borax, Oxi-Clean (enzymes/oxygen bleach), Chlorine Bleach or Ammonia (not together!) 4) An acid to sour the rinse water. 5) Hot water. Not the ice-cold junk the HE washers call hot, 125F minimum. This is the only way to make it work. And, boy, it does work. Brilliantly. Just, the all-in-one ökofreundliche mixture can't and doesn't work except in the purest of soft water with the most lightly soiled cottons. | ||
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Post# 921253 , Reply# 12 2/14/2017 at 07:08 (2,618 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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Who loves ya baby?
Pipe:
books.google.com/booksQUESTIONMA... A few things to remember. If you don't want to bother with the above measure out about two tablespoons of STPP, add to wash water. If it feels slippery then that is enough. If not keep adding more STPP each time testing for that slippery feeling. Once you arrive at that, stop and record how much phosphate it took to reach that level and that the amount you'll use going forward. With soap you want a rich layer of froth about 2"-3" deep at all times. If suds go down during wash add more soap solution. Water softening substances (soda, TSP, STPP, whatever....) are to be added to wash water *before* and mixed well before laundry. Soap solution or jelly is better than powder. If using powder then it should be dissolved in hot water first to make a solution, then poured into washer. Small amounts of phosphate (STPP of SHTP) must be added to at least the first hot rinse when using soap if water is hard. It is a good idea to do this regardless. You'll need at least two hot or several warm rinses before going to cold, bluing, final rinses. It is important that the fabric remain hot to boiling while soapy in order to flush out dirt and soap residue from mesh of fabric before cold water causes it to contract. If the latter happens before laundry is properly rinsed you'll have "tattle-tale grey" laundry. If possible one scalding rinse or boiling can take the place of several hot. | ||
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Post# 921528 , Reply# 14 2/15/2017 at 12:15 (2,616 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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Yes, in general use of detergent instead of soap means less rinsing is required, and yes you can use cold or warm water. However this also depends upon a few factors.
Extraction between rinses: If you do not extract water between rinses then the "carry over" of chemicals and whatever is greater so you need more dilution (rinses). Older front loaders like my Miele have four, five or more rinses but only extract after the second or third rinse. Modern machines extract after the wash and each subsequent rinse so they can get away with usually only three. Problem with powdered soap is that it can congeal or otherwise not totally dissolve in the wash. When that happens you'll get bits of soap on textiles that can prove difficult to shift. In the end when one goes to iron or the garments are otherwise exposed to heat that residual soap spots will turn brown. That and or they will oxidize over time forming a mark. Of course with really hot water and strong agitation soap powder "should" dissolve; but that is hard to tell once froth starts kicking up. Besides using a jelly or liquid allows the soap to at once begin working when in contact with water. Powdered soaps were marketed as the answer to save housewives and others the bother of shaving, flaking, chipping, scraping or whatever bits of soap from a bar into water, then having to wait for that lot to dissolve. In old days you grated or whatever enough soap for whatever amount of washing was planned the night before. It was put into some sort of earthenware or other heat proof container, then placed on the back of range (this was days when everyone used coal or wood fired) and allowed to sit overnight. By next morning you had soap jelly or liquid ready for laundry day. If you lived in a warm enough climate you could just grate up the stuff into water and allow it to sit overnight without the range. Commercial laundries had soap stock "cookers" that kept solution warm. Batches of soap were made up for the days work then kept in solution or jelly that way. Since detergents have far better soil suspension and anti re-depositing properties, rinsing can take place in cold or warm water. That being said commercial laundries and others often did or still do several rinses in hot (or warm) water. Have tons of soap in various forms (powder, Persil, bars, etc...)and enjoy using for the odd off washing. But would never use if in hurry and or as routine. Far too much work. | ||
| Post# 923243 , Reply# 15 2/22/2017 at 21:09 (2,609 days old) by vacuumguy99 (North Western PA) | ||
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Would a detergent be enhanced by adding a citrus solvent like d-limonele for really greasy laundry or would something like ammonia be a better alternative? | ||
| Post# 923249 , Reply# 16 2/22/2017 at 21:31 (2,609 days old) by vacuumguy99 (North Western PA) | ||
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Stupid question, I didn't realize d limonene is orange oil okay scratch that, any good laundry friendly degreaser | ||
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Post# 923255 , Reply# 17 2/22/2017 at 22:01 (2,609 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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Yes, there are plenty of good laundry degreasers
Same old school substances commercial laundries have used for ages;
Sodium metasilicate Sodium carbonate Sodium hydroxide (lye) OTOH you can use various solvents. Years ago it was petroleum substances such as turpentine, gasoline, benzene, naphtha. In fact any hydrocarbon will do; including limonene. Problem with some or all of these substances are flammability and residue. Then you have the fact most all leave some sort of scent that can be difficult to totally shift. | ||
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Post# 923463 , Reply# 19 2/23/2017 at 20:11 (2,608 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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Need not necessarily be a "high" pH; just alkaline. To a point stronger is better that is why washing soda is a better cleaner than borax; but the reaction is same.
It all comes down to something we all learned in chemistry classes while at school, saponification. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saponifica... Base substances react with fats or oils to become "soap". For cleaning or laundry purposes we use that process to turn fats/oils on surfaces or textiles into a soap that then can be washed away. When you pour lye based drain cleaner down drains it reacts with fats/oils to become "soap" that can be cleared away because the clog is now dissolved. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ester#Addi... High pH substances are or were a good choice because they are cheap and performed reliably at their task. But for laundry use they also bring a host of other issues. Higher pH used to "break" or for detergency means more rinsing is required including a sour bath to restore final pH levels that won't irritate skin. Repeated high pH washing also can take a toll on certain fabrics especially those of cotton or linen. Just one wash will likely destroy silk or wool fabrics. If you've ever used a powdered detergent, especially the more BOL bargain brands that left your clothing hard and scratchy; likely culprit was excessive washing soda, caustic soda and other high alkaline substances. In fact you can make a pretty good "detergent" using nothing more than some sort of surfactant and sodium metasilicate alone or blended with washing soda or another alkaline substance. For years laundries in UK and Europe did just that by using soap and metasilicate along with hot to boiling water. The other benefit of this was that the high pH also destroyed protein including blood stains. Persil soap powder was nothing more than PERborate, SILicate and soap. Hence the name PER-SIL. | ||
| Post# 923478 , Reply# 20 2/23/2017 at 20:54 (2,608 days old) by vacuumguy99 (North Western PA) | ||
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I think I had saw you explained how persil got its name in another post and that was very interesting to me, might shape how my diy detergent gets made. As far as the sour rinse goes what is the best product or compound you have found for the task as it seems to be an important step in washing with an alkaline detergent | ||
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Post# 923515 , Reply# 21 2/24/2017 at 03:58 (2,608 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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When using soap in a top loading washer or wringer machine
You want a lively rich layer of thick suds as shown:
You notice a recurring theme in Ivory Snow advertising; the supposed absence of "harsh detergent deposits".... Well Ivory Snow would leave things washed "softer" wouldn't it? Unlike powdered detergents then and largely now pure soap Ivory and others did not contain washing soda or other alkaline substances. Thus no such residue and or harsh feeling due to textile fibers being roughed up by high pH substances. The "deposits" spoken of are what happens when you use precipitating water softeners (washing soda, caustic soda etc...) which can cling to fabrics if laundry is not rinsed well. The other issue is something one has spoken about before; encrustation. Basically when using high or moderately high pH substances for laundry it causes textile mesh fibers to open. This is a good thing because soils can thus be easily flushed away. Problem is that if those fibers close down before all soils and residue are rinsed away that residue becomes trapped. Result is harsh, scratchy feeling laundry that soon becomes dull and tattle tale grey. The old way was to have one, two or more boiling, hot or at least warm rinses to make sure fabrics were free of residue before a final cold (or warm) rinse. This and or a "sour" would be used after the third or so rinse to dissolve any remaining alkaline substances out of the wash. Liquid laundry detergents are either neutral to only slightly base. They clean more based upon surfactant and enzyme action rather than brute high pH strength. Thus risk of encrustation is reduced. More importantly for commercial laundries and linen services things last longer and they can skip the sour and perhaps few rinses. This allows them to save money on supplies, energy, time and water. For wash loads that need extra oomph, commercial laundries have access to products like emulsifiers and breaks that can be used with liquid (or powder) detergents as needed. Finally as for all those soap products and their "harsh deposit" advert claims. Light duty detergents such as Dreft and Woolite soon displaced soap for "nice things". Eventually even Ivory Snow succumbed. P&G discontinued it as a soap and reformulated it as a light duty detergent. On another thing; to combat that "harsh" feeling early detergents left with laundry a new product hit the market, fabric softener. First used by commercial laundries and later introduced to consumers early formulas were nothing more than an emulsion of fats, oils and or tallow. The last should sound familiar since that is what soap is often made. So now P&G and others found away to sell "soap" back to American housewives who gave up using that for wash day. They now just added the stuff to the rinse. Dryer sheets both early and many today are nothing more than fabric coated with stearic acid, or fatty alcohols and or fatty acids. Again, soap more or less. This post was last edited 02/24/2017 at 05:18 | ||
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Post# 923516 , Reply# 22 2/24/2017 at 03:59 (2,608 days old) by Launderess (Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage) |
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Laundry Sour | ||
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Post# 923825 , Reply# 23 2/26/2017 at 00:47 (2,606 days old) by sudsmaster (SF Bay Area, California) |
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In my experience, STPP is rather stable on the shelf if it is kept dry and not overheated.
I don't think it spontaneously decomposes to TSP overnight as Keven intimated. One can easily check on the status of stored STPP by adding some to a solution of hard water (well water generally will be hard). Shake to dissolve, and then observe if the water is clear or if it has precipitates. If it is clear, the STPP is good. If there are precipitates (look like flakes), then the STPP may have gone off. I checked my stash some years ago using this method, comparing it to STP and to washing soda (Sodium carbonate). Sure enough the STP and washing soda resulted in precipitate, while the STPP solution remained clear. | ||
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