Fabric softener is a scam

I'm sorry to have to say, but the idea of "hair training" is a myth.

The oil glands (which are known as sebaceous glands, and produce an oil called "sebum") are controlled by genetics, hormones, and stress. Sebaceous glands don't have any sort of "sensor" to tell them when to produce more/less oil, so washing or not washing won't make a difference.

This is true, but greasy hair looks greasy and makes your pillow smell bad which impacts your ability to fall asleep.

Like sure, it's not natural to wash your hair every 2/3 days, but imo it's worth it

I'm a head-sweater so when I work out my hair gets as wet as it would in the shower. I'm not gonna leave it like that, it'll be stinky.

100%.

Use a shampoo that has aloe as the primary ingredient as well. Can comfortably make it a week and half before it looks gnarly.

Routinely get complimented on it so I know its not nasty.

Huh, I didn't know that. But I mean I gotta shower every couple of days at most anyway or I feel gross, so might as well.

Apple cider vinegar and tea tree oil baby. (I am not a gross hippy, shampoo dries the f out of my hair and Ive gone no shampoo for ~10 years)

I use dryer sheets for static. shrug

Obvious solution seems to be to put less oil in your hair? shrug

It was on the instructions on the bottles and IIRC in the ads for the major brands too.

Vinegar ain't basic, that's for sure.

I have been thinking of making my own fruit vinegar this year. Hopefully good enough to consume rather than just use for cleaning

O.O

That's a terrifying amount. I use around 1/4 cup for most mid to large loads. 1/2 maaaybe if it's a large towel load. Does the job well enough.

You definitely don't need that much vinigar. That said most new washing machine are using a chemical resistant silicone or TPE instead of more traditional rubber compound. This eliminated the already miniscule risk of acid damaging the seals.

If you add 3 cups(about 700 mL) of standard 5% acetic acid bleach to 4 gallons of water(~ 15000 mL) you end up with a 0.2% acetic acid you will end up with a pH of something like 5.5 or about the pH of healthy skin. A lot of HE washers will use a 5 gallon initial wash so it's likely to be even gentler than what I came up with in my rough napkin math guesstamate.

Meh. I say you need half a cup to a cup. A splash don't do it.

Yeah, the cheap standard powder detergent would probably be less expensive. The volume you'd need to make to beat it is huge. Like, maybe five years' worth.

I am also laughing at making washing powder in the oven to save money. The amount you'd spend on electricity would put you in the red, unless you live in a petrostate with free electricity or something.

Not to mention the gas to go to the three separate stores you probably need to buy that shit from.

Is it actually cheaper than buying dry detergent for cheap?

Edited: spelling corrections

Regular laundry detergent leaves residue as well, that's why a lot of washers have self clean cycles.

Vinegar will cut most residues from a washer. It's one of the reasons it works as a softener, it removes detergent residue and minerals from hard water to make your clothes soft. As a side note a lot fabric softeners does the same thing by coating this fibres of the clothes in refined beef fat.

If you want a really clean machine (specific to most HE washers) put half a teaspoon of TSP(trisodium phosphate) in the empty drum of the machine and another half teaspoon where you put your detergent, fill the bleach cup and the fabric softener cup with vinegar. Set the machine to run a pre wash cycle then a heavy duty cycle on the hottest water temp(if there is a hot tap that is after your clothes washer in the pipeline, you can run that tap until it gets hot before starting the washer. HE washers use a lot less water so most of the time they are filling with cold water before the hot water rescues the machine) and as many extra rinses as your machine will allow.

After the TSP removes most of the residue, it's rinsed away and then the bleach cup of vinigar is released with the next rinse cycle. Since TSP is basic and the vinegar is acidic they react and the TSP is neutralized, this may lead to some deposits of various salts(depending on the exact reaction ratio, if there is an excess of vinigar then the acidic solution will help prevent the salts from depositing.

When the fabric softener cup of vinigar is released in the next rinse we ensure that all acidic solution is flushed through the machine. This again will help with any salt deposits and help clean any of the remaining residue that reacts better to the acidic solution.

Any extra rinses after that help make sure that anything that can be washed away will be. Your washer will be very clean inside.

TSP can be purchased at the hardware store for cleaning surfaces before you paint them, just make sure it's actually TSP and not a TSP replacement. Half a teaspoon of TSP in with your dish soap will make you love your dishwasher again. A little goes a long way, and using less TSP is more likely to give you a good result than using more.

That enormous rant aside, I have used homemade laundry soap recipes in several HE machines including two combination washer dryers(where the washing drum is the same as the drying drum, looks like a single HE machine, not a stacked washer and dryer) and in general those machines have more residue problems. I haven't really had any issues. That might be related to the fact that I do not put an excess of soap or detergent into the machine, again often less is more, and if you need better cleaning it's better to do a prewash cycle than add more detergent into the main cycle. More detergent =/= better cleaning, just more residue. Try washing a dish by hand with only liquid dish soap, no water, no damp sponge, just soap and a dry brush or dishcloth. While this is an extreme example, it does help illustrate that detergents or soaps allow grease and grime to be dissolved into water, and that's what allows it to clean effectively, the soap or detergent is just there to get stuff into the water.

Borax sensitivity is a legit concern.

Don't need the /s on here, all the idiots are still on reddit

There's always avocados in the banana stand!

At the current rate? Depending on where you live, 3-10.

It was the primary cause of milia on my arms/legs. It took me years to figure out why my arms always had things that looked like whiteheads but couldn’t be as there was no infected area around them.

If there was a Lemmy community for fighting or complaining the use of useless fragrance, I would join it right now.
Let's make !nofragrance real !

This is pure conjecture, but my guess is that the film of fabric softener left on the clothes would interfere with the fire retardant fibers/may be flammable itself.

also, soooo many people will just ignore power usage bills, which can be quite substantial in some areas. Running my oven for an hour straight is not exactly cheap

The amount at Costco is about 5lbs, so that is more than the 2.2lbs y’all are talking about.

The numbers on the cap are just numbers and lines on the cap. You assign meaning to them as the maker never tells you what they are for.

Yeah I buy maybe 2 £4 bottles of washing liquid a year, because I put in like 1/4 of what it tells me to.

So honestly making my own just isn't worth the time.

and they we have pods. Which are the hugest ripoff per load, but for the first time people are actually using the right amount of detergent and they're all amazed that the machines don't get gummed up.

Just measure the real stuff right?

In my opinion the only times I'm ever uncomfortably hot is when I'm choosing voluntarily to be in the sun. For example going to beach.

99% of the time I'm in 67 degree AC in a hoodie lol

Admittedly I run cool, was born here. But ride to work in the Merino wool t-shirts from Unbound or silk/Merino thin knit sweater and also merino socks, and arrive absolutely presentable, so much better than cotton, not better than linen, but better looking for an office. Only the v-neck though, can't stand it near my neck, that does itch. And not all brands, only Unbound for the T-shirts. Silk/Merino blend always rocks.

I shave mine with a safety razor. Knobbliness of head is probably a factor though!

I bought a Leaf Razor from an EU reseller about a year ago now and it was a game changer for head shaving with safety razor blades.

The head of the handle pivots so it's very difficult to cut myself with it accidentally unlike the regular handle I was using before.

I'm hesitant to share a link because I don't want to seem like a shill for a company I don't know much about but just wanted to say there are options out there!

I found a razor just got clogged up too much between the blades.

You might have better luck with one of those bog-standard single-blade safety razors, i.e. one of these:

I've heard from a hairdresser that they prefer the single-blade ones, specifically because the multi-blade ones clog up so much.

I mean, currently I also use a trimmer for my face, as I cannot be asked to do a wet shave every day. But I still use the safety razor for cutting back armpits and groin for hygiene reasons, and it works quite well for that. It's a lot less scary when you don't have to cut thick beard hair.

I have a rechargeable trimmer. Like you, I'm never going for that ultra-close shave. I have fairly light/thin facial hair though, so the 5 o'clock shadow looks works well for me.

i bought for cheap one pluggable razor much more powerful than those with batteries ... also you have to oil the blades and clean them regularly.

Buy a merkur handle. I have the merkur futur and that’s lasted about 20 years so far.

Problem with the powder is not all of it dissolves, especially at 30C. End up with crusty baked on powder around the dispenser. Maybe dissolve in a little water and then treat it like liquid detergent? Might try that

There's more than one store to buy such things at, try Home Depot for instance, they even carry the stuff in bulk. And online purchasing exists so you're not relegated to just that option.

If you believe being independent is more important, then more power to you. But even "making your own" you're dependent on getting the baking soda and soap from stores as well so it's really just a matter of how much you need to save and how far you're willing to go to secure that savings.

P = = oven average power ~1kW=1/1000MW
C = = electricity cost ~50 to 200 $/MWh
Δt = = process time duration ~1.0h
Total = P x C x Δt
... so, a few cents maximum, right ?
... it's more the time and effort you put in !

I'd recommend powdered detergent instead. It's usually far cheaper per load since you aren't paying for them to ship you the water that's in the liquid detergent.

You also don't need to follow the 'load size' guidelines listed on the scoop, as only the bottom line or two is really adding anything to most loads.

Relevant Technology Connections Video

Dryer balls supposedly help with this

From what I've heard, dryer balls help the drying process by warming up faster than the wet clothes and drying from inside the pile. And even if that turns out to have been misinformation, I'm not too annoyed by it because it's a single low-cost expense whereas dryer sheets are consumables

Just the sort of information that I was after, thank you.

Interesting take, it's the first that I'm hearing about them gumming up the machine's innards, but I can definitely see that being a serious issue over time.

Sound habits, these. Except for the front-loader, and Oxiclean, it sounds like we're on the same page. Aside from these strategies, I figure that the quality of the clothes, and having kept all synthetics out of my dresser/closet have helped to lengthen the life of my clothing as well.

I often wash towels with other things though. It would be rather wasteful to run a second load just for towels.

Small batches in an old blender. Grated soap mixed with you washing soda, borax or whatever else you are using as a booster. The powders will coat the soap as it gets cut apart and keeping it from clumping back together.

This is hard on a blender so do smaller batches (and don't use a good blender. Get one from goodwill or the like for ~ 10 bucks}. It will also produce very fine airborne power when you open the blender. I promise you that you don't want strong alkaline powers in your lungs, and even if you do it will make the air taste terrible. Do this in a well ventilated place, use PPE, and be careful. I find that after you powder it, the soap in the mixture holds on to the other ingredients and keep them from becoming airborne.

Also use a laundry soap bar, the soap is often stronger so you can use less and it doesn't have ingredients to moisturizer or make the soap easy on the skin. Those often contribute to buildup issues.

I wrote up a big rant with detailed instructions on how to remove residue from washers. A clean washer performed better and it's over of the reasons people get a new washer and it ends up cleaning much better.

EDIT: a link to my washer cleaning and residue removal rant

The freedom was always sarcastic

soon enough it will be nazi units

So the metric units? Those were used by racists and genocidal tyrants throughout history.

I tend to use moon landing units.

Wow I had not even realised that this would actually be a well defined unit. I thought it was like "add a spoon of sugar" in recipes.

And then bastardised.

Chad UK/Irish Imperial pint: 568ml

Virgin US Customary Unit pint: 473ml

Yeah, which is why I added the note about cleaning power per unit volume. But it'd have to be a fair bit more powerful to make the effort worth it, I think.

We use maybe 50ml of Tide (so that'd be probably 100 loads) when doing our laundry, so if that's equivalent to like one tablespoon of the Borax mix, I could see it saving me $20 or so overall, if it's three times stronger.

So it'd come down to how much time I spend shopping and combining the mixture vs just buying it.

Mind, that's just the borax. Bar soap and baking soda are cheap but not free.

(edit: and before someone jumps on me about "baking soda", I was thinking of it in terms of decomposing it into carbonate in the oven. I haven't priced out washing soda)

Many clothes, especially athletic/athleisure fabrics, should not be washed with fabric softener. Check the label to be sure.

I don't, but dryer sheets are incredibly cheap too.