Laundry in boot camp: Procedures?

Factual Questions
21

The toilets are still salt water, IIRC.

I only encountered salt-water showers once on a very old amphibious assault ship (probably built in WWII), but showers are fresh water these days.

Have you tried to shower or do laundry with salt water? It leaves an irritating residue. Plus, salt water in a washing machine would rapidly corrode it.

Interestingly, the water used in the steam plant was not just distilled, but was also deionized. At the temperatures and pressures used in the steam plant, any chlorides whatsoever could cause very rapid pitting and corrosion of the piping (as in minutes). In fact, we had meters constantly monitoring the salinity of the makeup water. High chlorides were an emergency.

The ship’s distillation unit used steam to distill the water. It had very good capacity, but it broke down a lot. There was also a much lower capacity evaporator that just used an electrically-powered heater. It was pretty bullet-proof, but it only produced enough water for makeup water for the steam plant.

Once we went out for some weekly ops, and the distillation unit broke when it was started up as we left port. They didn’t manage to get it fixed until a week or 10 days later as we were driving back to port, so there were no showers or laundry the whole time. :rolleyes: I usually went to sea with about 3 weeks worth of clean underwear for situations like this.

22

Varies per service, post and time period.

Mid-1980s Army Basic, Fort McClellan version:

Bed linens handled centrally (contractor working for the Post Quartermaster).

Towel in current use draped over railing at foot of bunk.

Daily use items went in your laundry bag (tied to a foot post of the bunk) and you’d have to sign up for a turn at the platoon bay’s laundry room – limited hours, limited machines, but it turned out to be sufficient with good time management.

Dress Uniform, at most you’d only wear it on graduation day, so no need to do anything after the QM did your initial issue fitting.
In our BT batallion our DSs ordered that we were to have NO “static display” items (stuff kept in pristine mint condition exclusively to exhibit). Everything hanging in your locker or placed in the drawers was to be in rotation to be worn.

23

I know my memory is shot but it’s threads like this that really make that clear.

I have no memory at all of how laundry was handled in basic training. I clearly remember red grease pencil all over the shower after we cleaned it, beds turned upside down because they were not made perfectly and ironing but I couldn’t tell you with any certainty if I washed my own clothes or if someone else did it for me.

24

Air Force Basic Military Training, circa 2007:

Each trainee is issued something like two or three mesh laundry bags with zippers (state of the art, the Air Force is nowadays, no bigass safety pins for us!) and little tags to write our laundry marks on (first initial of last name, last four of social security number). These mesh bags went inside of a green laundry bag that had draw strings on on one end and a zipper on the bottom. You’d use the draw string to secure the laundry bag to the railing on the footboard of the bed, and use the zipper to get in and out of it.

The idea was, when you soiled some clothes, you’d put white stuff in one zipper bag, and non-white stuff in another zipper bag. Typically, this would mostly be PT gear and some under-shirts and boot socks. Some flights, the trainees would take any items that weren’t inspection ready, and throw them into the laundry bag (our TI checked for just this thing when he did inspections, and would ream the whole flight if he found anybody doing it). Whenever we weren’t in class, a laundry detail from the flight would gather up all the laundry into big sacks and take them to one of the squadron laundry rooms to wash. They’d bring it back and dump it on the floor in a big mess so we could sort it out and fold/roll it to precise measurements (remember: If there’s so much as a single wrinkle on your socks, you just let the terrorists into your dorm to slaughter your entire flight. Because you’re a horrible person. Also possibly something could be said about the quality of your parentage.)

In practice, the laundry detail could be relied upon to entirely loose some of your laundry. I ended up having to buy a crap ton of socks after I got to my first training assignment after Basic.

But yeah, after you get out of basic, the way laundry works is, well, uhm… you take your dirty clothes, and you wash them. In the washing machines down the hall, typically. You’d leave a copy of your AETC Form 341 (shudder) on the machine you were using, so that folks could find you when your laundry was done, or take it to your sergeant if you had laundry in the machine during duty hours (or, depending on the flight, during the weekly dorm cleanup details, what the Army would call “IG Time”)

Now that I’m out of the dorms? My wife and I put our dirty clothes in a hamper, and whoever gets to it first takes it and does laundry in the washing machine located just off our kitchen.:smiley:

25

After USMC infantry training I was sent to an Army base for a school where we slept in barracks. Unlike the quonset huts I’d been used to, the barracks were luxurious…indoor plumbing, heat and even washing machines.

Anyway, I had just put a load of government issue white T shirts and boxers in a washer. Someone asked if he could throw in a shirt. I said “sure” and walked away. Turns out it was red. Ever bunk/live with a bunch of Marines when all your underwear was pink?

26

Mid '80s ballistic missle submarine, middle of a patrol.

A conventional ET put in a special request chit to become a “conscientous objector.” They immediately yanked him off his job tending the ships inertial navigation system and stuck him in the laundry room. He became the laundry queen for the remainder of the patrol, did a good job too.

When we pulled back in and the gangplank went over he was the first person off as I remember.

Otherwise each division sent one of their junior guys down to do the division’s laundry.

27

What’s a “conventional ET”?

28

“conventional” = non-nuclear power trained
“ET” = Electronics Technician (a U.S. Navy rating, i.e. job specialty)

Nuke ETs are reactor operators and reactor technicians. They also repair and maintain all of the electronic equipment in the engine room, including the reactor safety systems.

Conventional ETs repair and maintain the electronic equipment up forward, such as the navigational equipment.

29

Try washing something with soap or detergent and sea water. Sea water isn’t great for detergents, you tend to get crud collecting and the soap doesn’t want to rinse out, and it takes forever to dry.

30

Why was sea water need to be filtered. In the middle of the ocean it is clear.
They did make a soap to use with sea water. I never use any but my dad did.
Also I would use the salt water shower to cool down after coming off watch in the boiler room. But I always rinsed off with fresh water.

31

I forgot another method - you can also return a uniform to your quartermaster because of “wear and tear”, even if the wear and tear consists only of dirt, and get a new set on the spot.

32

Former Navy ET here. I never heard of ET’s referred to as conventional. Back in the mid 70’s when I did my time, there were ETN’s and ETR’s. An ETN specialized in communications equipment, ETR’s specialized in radar. I spent most of my time working in communications at a naval air station then a sub tender. When I was promoted to 3rd class, it was as an ETR.

33

That was before the Navy did away with designators. I was a CES (Construction Electrician - Shop), and there were several other designators: P (power), W (interior wiring), T (telephone). Tests were geared to your designated specialty. Unfortunately, most electricians didn’t work in their specialties, as they were assigned to billets as needed. I worked as an interior wiring electrician the entire time. Eventually, the Navy got rid of designators and everybody took the same test from then on.

34

Me either.

I went to boot camp in Orlando a couple years before Dio (1981), so I’m guessing we handled it the same way… My husband went to boot a few years before me (1976, also in Orlando) and he says they had laundry POs who actually sorted the stuff for them and put it on their racks for them to fold… but I have no direct memory of this myself.

I do remember that we had ironing boards to iron our dungarees ourselves. We all had to learn to iron and prove that we knew how to do it. After we’d passed the little ironing test, they no longer cared that we each did our own. Consequently, there was a lot of swapping of ironing and boot-shining duties. I was a lousy shoe-shiner, so I had another girl do my boots and I did her ironing.

35

Worked exactly the same for me at Fort Sill in 2006.

36

Went to Basic at Fort Knox, 1989. We had washer and driers in our platoon area. In the evening when we had our time to shine boots etc, we would start doing laundry if needed. The bags were lined up and as long as we were up we took care of our own laundry. After lights out there was always a fire guard. The fire guard was responsible for pulling out the dry clothes and getting in the other clothes into the wash.