Nappy Laundering Services Washing Procedures

Just wondering what nappy laundering services use for washing nappies??

there are a lot of posts about recommendation for getting smells/stains out of nappies etc. so just wondered what laundry places use i.e. temp, bio/non-bio, wash cycle, extra rinses?

i prefer to use bio for my washing but am finding that it is giving my boy a red willy! am using 1 tablet of bold/aquados bio. how much does everyone else use?? i am switching to powder vs tablets and going to put in one tablespoon i think.

jackie x

i use 1 tablespoon of bio (sainsbury's) and 60, smells no probs, cold prewash i think helps with that. lavender imo smells lovely.

stains - have had napisan recommended but it reacts with our bum but gets them sparkly

sun when its warm enough to line dry works miracles too

I am pretty sure laundry services wash at 90 degrees and use bio powder.

We wash at 40 degrees with one bio Aquados tablet with a cold rinse at the beginning and an extra rinse at the end. I don't believe bio powder should irritate as long as you ensure it is fully washed out.

Perhaps you could try stripping them, in case you have a bit of a build up of powder?

i do cold rinse at beginning and end. wash at 60 with the wash plus and aqua plus (for sensitive skin i think) functions selected (i have a bosch machine).

not sure about stripping, how do i do that again?? and i assume i do it after they are washed not for the dirty nappies??

was thinking of giving them a wash through with no detergent to get rid of the excess and start again, would that be alright??

jackie x

We always use 1 tablet of bio then do a short wash without powder. If we don't do the final wash (bio or non-bio) we see a red rash over the entire nappy area. We used the liquid concentrate for a while, but the tablets are cheaper (ATM).

The harder the water in your area the more powder you need to use so that the water softeners that are in the powder have a chance to dissolve enough of the washing stuff. If that makes sense Therefore, the more powder you use, the more you have to ensure it is washed out again at the end.

Washing them on empty should help iirc. To strip them, use bicarb of soda instead of powder and rinse til they're clear. Also, do maintenance wash on the machine to make sure there's no powder residues in the workings.

HTH

great will give that a try. just got this machine in december and have done monthly maintenance washes since getting it so should be fine in that respect.

we live in scotland so the water here is really soft. nappies seem to be getting clean with just the one tablespoon on bio so that is good.

how often do others strip nappies??

God, am I doing something wrong, our nappy wash routine is so much simpler than all of the ones I've read here, I wasn't aware I was supposed to be doing anything special with them

I just use 1 capful of concentrated liquid (as opposed to 3 caps for normal clothes washes) and wash on 40 generally and a 60 (highest my machine does) every now and then.

My machine doesn't have extra rinse, prewash or anything settings, it's an indesit moon and is VERY simple to use (only 4 buttons) and fool proof, it apparently has a detector for detergent, so when rinsing it will continue until it detects no more soap.

Mareth.... I don't do anything else either and I have an ariston.

The rinse sensor sounds like a really good thing. There's a bloke who runs the ukwhitegoods site and forum that posts on netmums and he does a lot of work testing machines and powders. Apparently a lot of new machines don't use enough water in the rinse cycle to get all the powders out of the fabrics but they do achieve the A rating for water consumption Therefore to wash all the residues out of absorbent things like nappies and towels they quite often need an extra rinse to avoid rashes and skin reactions.