water, clothing, soap (directly under the fill spout so it dissolves quickly)
Ew, you people add detergent after the clothes? :eek:
The correct procedure is: start the water, add detergent (liquid), then start adding clothes a few items at a time, placing them around the tub so it’s more or less balanced. Towels, jeans, and other heavy stuff should be placed in semicircles around the circumference of the tub, again, to avoid unbalance. By the time you’ve put everything in, the water should be about done filling, so you can close the lid and let the cycle run.
If you’re using bleach, dry bleach, or oxy-stuff, it definitely goes in with water before clothes so it can dilute/dissolve.
Eh, I would probably put them in around the same time I put in the detergent, but I’m a heathen apparently. Whenever I use Borax, it goes in at the same time, so I don’t really view it as different.
cleaning and bleaching agents directly on clothes can damage them. these should be added when the tub water is above clothes.
Start the machine filling with water, measure out detergent and add. Then mix the detergent and water using my first item (NOT a towel or anything similarly absorbent.). This dilutes the detergent and allows for a more even distribution. Drop the item in.
If I’m using powdered bleach, I put that in before the detergent, then mix using the first item (but don’t drop the item in). Then add detergent and mix again.
Maybe not optimal, but if you haven’t noticed any problems over the years, it’s at least adequate. I don’t know if my method winds up being that much better, but I do it because I read it in Consumer Reports years ago.
I use liquid detergent, have a washer that won’t fill with water unless the lid is closed, and add powdered Borax to half the loads I do. When I’m not in a hurry, I toss in the detergent and Borax, start the water (closing the lid) and let it fill for an inch or two. Then I dump in the clothes. If I’m in a hurry, I put in the detergents, add the clothes and start 'er up. And sometimes I forget and dump the detergent on top of the dry clothes. I’ve never had stains from the detergent, but then I don’t add bleach, either.
Our machines will not fill with the lid open. They also contain instructions to add detergent, then put in the clothes. So I pour the detergent in, pile in the clothes, swipe my card (apartment machines where you load money onto a plastic card rather than insert coins), and turn on the appropriate cycle. So far, my clothes haven’t been damaged and they seem to get clean enough. The only sorting I do is one hot wash and one cold wash, which roughly corresponds to whites/colors.
Water on, let it fill for about 3 minutes, which gives me about four inches or so at the bottom of the tub. Add the detergent, and let it fill for another 3 minutes or so. If I’m using (any kind of) bleach (liquid chlorine, dry color-safe or oxy-type) I add it with the detergent and let it fill for 5-7 minutes so that it’s really well diluted. Then I add the clothes.
Jeez! My washing machine has directions on it. Water, detergent, clothes. My detergent also has directions on it, which fortunately agree with the WM. My bleach bottle also has directions on it, which are to mix the bleach with a quart of water and add 5 minutes after the cycle starts.
If it’s been washing a few minutes and I find a stray sock or washcloth or something, I’ll open it and throw that in.
I would NEVER wash towels in a load with anything other than other towels. And towels of a similar color at that (light, dark). You could get towel fuzz on things. Or light-colored towel fuzz on dark-colored towels.
I’ve washed towels with lots of things and never gotten towel fuzz on anything. I didn’t know that a problem.
I was getting occasional residue, then switched from powder to liquid. Haven’t had any since.
It can be a problem. However, the bigger problem is that towels are pretty abrasive against other clothing/laundry. If you wash certain types of fabric with towels, you might get a lot of pilling, which I hate.
And in my house it’s water, detergent, laundry. If you have particularly delicate items, then you might want to switch to this order. Otherwise, if what you’ve been doing is working for you…I wouldn’t worry too much about it.
I grew up with front loaders where the soap, bleach and softener go into a little drawer on top, and everything gets loaded before starting the machine. One advantage of the little drawer is that any soap that’s not dissolved doesn’t reach the clothes: you can get soap residue if you use too much soap, but it will be in the drawer. When faced with a top loader, I follow the instructions on the soap and machine.
The front loaders at the university last year had the little drawers inside the cover, so adding things later would have meant stopping the machine, waiting for the water to drain out, then adding whatever.
Sounds to me like some of you need better towels, too. I’ve had that kind of problems, but only with El Pato Cheapo brands.
I was really confused when I moved to the US for grad school, because all the laundry machines in Korea are those drawer types. Seems to make more sense to me.
I put the liquid detergent in the drum (I don’t use the machines that have you top-load the detergent, except for occasional washes of my bedspread), put the clothes in, then pop in the quarters and get the cycle going.
It’s worked for me very well for many years.
Ha. Vindicated. My ex-roommate got irrationally upset at me when she discovered that I did water, detergent, clothes, but she couldn’t explain to me why I was doing it wrong.
I would never pour detergent on top of my clothes; seems way too harsh, encourage fading, stretching, and weakening of the garment.
Water, detergent, clothes if a top loader.
If a front loader, they idiot-proof it for you, so it’s clothes, add detergent in top compartment, and the water flows through the detergent so it sprays clothes with detergenty-water.
I remember the older machines had to dissolve the coarse detergent before the advent of the liquids, and had separate compartments for detergent and bleach.
I work in all my clothes so they are never clean after a couple weeks anyway. As long as they smell clean, I don’t care, they get dirty within the first hour every morning.
Open lid, overload machine with crappy work apparel, put the liquid stuff right on top, close lid, run away and hope someone steals it all.
So, that I’m forced to buy new clothes.
I don’t bother with any clothes called White.
White is a lie.
Bleach doesn’t make clothes white, just holy.
People who have white clothes…either just bought em or just plain don’t work. :dubious:
Okay, I’ll experiment next time I do mine. (I live alone, so I go about a week before doing it again.) Switch it up again and see what makes me feel cleanest or whatnot.
The instructions on the inside of the lid say to put in the detergent, then the clothes, then start up the machine, so that’s what I do, and then go away for a half-hour until they need to be put in the dryer. I’m sure there are other ways that work, too, but I know this way works, and I can’t see much benefit to me in doing it any other way.