Introduction#
Once you’ve mastered the fundamentals, you might decide that you want to go deeper down the laundry rabbit hole. After all, laundry is something that you will do for your entire life… why not invest some time to learn how to do it well? The writings in this section are some of my deeper learnings about laundry. Hopefully they can help you win at laundry too.
Getting Started#
Aside from my PNW Washing Guide, very little of what I’ve written here is meant for beginners. If you are just getting started on your laundry learning journey, start with my PNW washing guide. There are also some good resources available on Dirty Laundry. And there is an active community on the r/laundry forum on Reddit. (Be aware that on reddit you will get a wide range of perspectives and opinions so it’s good to stay curious and double-check things as you go. Yes, that’s a polite way of saying sometimes people on Reddit are wrong.)
Building up a knowledge base that allows you to be successful across all the crazy things that laundry can throw your way takes time, patience, and experimentation. Sometimes there’s failure and frustration along the journey. The failures can be infuriating and feel like high stakes… it’s your laundry we’re talking about here. Be kind to yourself in the process. We’ve all messed up plenty of times. You will too. I find I’m at my calmest when I stay calm and curious.
Essential Tools and Tips#
You’re going to need to know your water hardness so look it up. Your municipality publishes a periodic water quality report - read it. Some water systems have different hardness levels at different times of the year so be on the look out for that.
You’re going to need to know what the textiles you’re washing are made out of. Advanced protocols will need to be varied based on what material you are working with. Cotton, polyster, wool, elastaine… you need to know so get in the habit of looking.
If you’ve got a front loader washer, get a good flashlight. You’re going to need to be able to look inside and see what’s going on.
Know That Your Learning is about Your Laundry#
Laundry is personal.
We all have different preferences for laundry. Some folks care a lot about energy efficiency. Some folks care a lot about time efficiency. Some folks care a lot about minimizing fabric wear. Some folks like fragrance in their clean laundry, and some folks can’t tolerate fragrance at all. Whatever your preferences, being clear about them will help you get to the right result for you. And what’s right for you might be different from what’s right for someone else.
Not all laundry is the same. What’s ideal for a chef washing greasy work clothes might not be great for an accountant washing polo shirts. A load of towels is going to have a completely different fiber surface area than a load of polyester track suits. A wool blanket is going to require different handling than a set of flannel sheets. You will develop minor adjustments to your process based on your load type and that’s a good sign that you’re skills are growing.
Different machines can have wildly different behaviors. An old school top loader works differently than a modern top loader, and both work differently than a front loader. A machine with an impeller works different than a machine without an impeller. A direct drive front loader has different agitation and balance dynamics than a belt driven front loader. A European machine usually has different temperature behaviors than a US machine, which has to meet DOE energy usage requirements. Wash cycle times can run anywhere from a few minutes to as long as a few hours. Machines may offer anywhere from one to as many as five or more rinse stages based on cycle and settings. All of this really influences what chemistry will work best for you. To truly perfect your result you will have to figure out and understand how YOUR specific machine works. And manufacturers don’t reliably disclose these details so it’s often a process of discovery.
Laundry detergents are a complex blend of chemicals all working in concert to produce a specific result. Surfactants, enzymes, alkalinity builders, oxidizers, and water softeners all play specific roles. Anti-redeposition agents, oxidizer activators, optical brighteners, and other specialty chemicals can also play particular roles. Understanding what these chemicals are and how they work will greatly improve your success rate.
My Preferences#
Since my advice is heavily informed by my preferences I will share those preferences plainly:
- I live in a place with very soft water. This means rinsing performance is something I am ALWAYS paying close attention to. It also means I can be more flexible on detergent formulations that I use. (That said, I do still tend to avoid detergent formulations with soap because the soap is hard to rinse out and it will oxidize over time.)
- I am very strictly fragrance-free. In fact, there are even some fragrance-free detergents that I don’t love the smell of on things that get close to my face (e.g. shirts, towels, and bedding).
- I don’t wash in cold water. Ever. My lowest wash temp is 30C / 86F. Yes that includes my wool blankets. Washing in lower temperatures is an unnecessary “hard mode” that I avoid.
- I currently use LG front loaders not because I think they are great washers, but because I have invested a lot of time in understanding how they work. If you have or are considering an LG front loader, you should probably read all my writings about them on this site.
Advanced Temperature Measurement#
When you look at wash temperature you’ll notice it really isn’t accurately represented by a single number. Instead it’s a graph of temperatures over time. For example, a washer might fill at 40C, but then the temperature might drop over the duration of the wash stage. Or if the machine has an internal heater, it might fill at some temperature below the target and raise the temperature over the duration of the wash stage. Knowing an approximate temperature for your wash stage is helpful. But knowing the whole temperature curve can help you understand more details about how much time your load is above the sebum melt point, how long your optimal enzymatic period is, and whether or not your wash stage is warm enough to materially activate percarbonate. If you decide you want to take some measurements like this, you can use an industrial temperature logger. I have successfully used a Lascar EL-USB-1-Pro. For safety I tie it into a sock and put the sock in another small mesh delicates bag. I tend to pause the machine after wash cycle completes to remove the logger, but I have run it through the spin cycle before and it survived without incident.