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We have a high efficiency toploader and also a water softener. Our motherease sandys stink like ammonia. I need some help with a regular wash routine considering the above as well as some help with what and how to strip the diapers.
We gave up cloth diapering for a while for this reason but #3 is on the way (March 8th or so, God willing). And we need to save ourselves some money.
Our toddler is 20 months old now and I'd like to get him back into the above diapers as well as put our newborn in our prefolds.
Any help is much appreciated.
Amanda |
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My regular wash routine (front-loader) looks like this: dry pail, pre-wash, sanitary cycle. I didn't use the sanitary cycle with my last front-loader (different house and country), but feel I need to here because we have an on-demand hot water heater, and it takes too long to get hot to make the wash water really hot. With a typical water heater, I think I'd be able to use just plain hot cycle. That's just a pretty basic routine that many of us use, with personal variations for washer/water, etc.
So, how to get rid of the current stink? Rinse, rinse, rinse on hot, hot, hot until you don't see suds. Since you have a top loader, I would run hot water, and then add some boiling water (get the munchkins out of the way) to make it hotter still. Then dump in a whole lot of vinegar (think cups, if not the whole bottle; you can't really overdo it and the higher the concentration the better). Let it sit, and if you can, just have it agitate periodically for a while before you run it through the wash part of the cycle. The acid in vinegar might help break up the detergent/mineral bonds and help get the detergent out of your diapers. It feels horrible using so much water, but you really have to keep washing them in hot water without detergent until you aren't seeing many if any bubbles.
How to keep it from happening again? How much detergent were you using? Most of us find that 1/4 to 1/2 of the recommended ammount of detergent is plenty, and more than that can cause problems. If you are already using he detergent, it can seem like such a small amount that you are using, but it's probably sufficient. It might be worth trying a different detergent (there are some links to detergent rating lists in previous posts; if I remember I'll try to dig them up or maybe someone else has them handy).
Hard water that it then softened can present some challenges. I know that when I stay with my in-laws I have a very hard time keeping my diapers happy with their hard/softened water. I keep meaning to bring with some of my Country Save detergent to use instead of their Tide to see if it helps. DH says that I should gather water from their RO filter to use for the load, since the softening salts have been removed, but I haven't tried that yet, given the logistics of the filtering rate. Adding vinegar to your wash or rinse routine might help and I would say it's worth a try to add a glug to the softener dispenser for each load--it might help and it probably won't hurt. Some people have found that Calgon can be helpful (might help with stripping?).
Also, one tip to make your washer use a little more water (I know it's against the goal of a high-efficiency washer) is to get the diapers wet before you put them into the washer, since the water setting is based on weight (or at least it is for my front-loader).
If your water is a real challenge, pre-folds or flats should be a little less prone to build up. But ME diapers are awesome and I hope that with a little experimenting you can find a routine that works for you and keeps the stinks away. |
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| My wash routine is similar, with the occasional extra rinse when I think it's needed. If there's an option on your machine for a "heavy soil" load, I would use it b/c it sends more water to the machine. |
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| my reply disappeared and when I tried to repost it went to the softness tio.. weird! I'll go copy and paste it here |
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| my reply disappeared and when I tried to repost it went to the softness tio.. weird! I'll go copy and paste it here |
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where's my reply!! I sent it. but don't see it, here I'll send it again, sorry if you see two posts from me.
first off, I have a long history of cloth diapering with motherease, and I do not use any recommended routine, and I think my personal laundry style is what makes my diapers never end up stinky (like my sisters, and others)
first off, I do not separate diapers from the rest of the laundry (no separate hamper, no pail, and absolutely nothing that is totally sealed like plastic) I treat a diaper the same as I would any article of clothing or bedding, or towels. I also do not have more than 6 diapers per load.
I believe too many diapers causes the rinse cycle to get concentrated with urine.
my sister traded me some prefolds and they smelled alful when baby peed in them. I didn't do any special treatment to get smell out, I just put them in the wash with other clothing as frequently as possible and with mainly other clothing and hopefully only a few or less diapers, after about a month the smell was gone, next time I am thinking about seeing if the sun can get the smell out since it works great on poop stains___I hope this reply works, I noticed that one reply was sent twice. I want to stress avoid keeping diapers in any plastic container, and every day I do a load, so I don't know if it is that the diapers are frequently washed without too many hours of sitting in urine, or if it's because I mixed my diapers with the rest of my laundry so that rinse cycle has very little urine to contend with at a time. (my diapers are old, I have used them for 7 children for the last 10 years, they have thinning but they function and the snaps work great and the area of the diaper that the baby goes in has plenty of terry. I have both onesize and sandy style diapers, natural color) when I go out I just throw diaper in a breathable bag or wrap it in a towel or baby blanket. |
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| In my original reply, I mentioned how I stripped my sisters diapers that she traded with me. I simply used my regular routine of combining diapers with rest of laundry, I made sure that the stinky diapers where added to every load, and no more than a few diapers per load of regular household laundry, after about a month, the smell was gone. |
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| If you haven't tried them yet, try using soapnuts!! They really helped our stink issues!!! |
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I use the following wash routine-I have found after 10 years of cloth diapering that this is the only way to keep our stinkies away. I really feel like most stinky problems are caused from diapers not getting clean enough in the washer- usually from not using enough detergent.
Cold soak
HOT wash/cold rinse cycle with 1/2 scoop TIDE powder
Extra rinse on cold with simplicity fabric softener.
Everything in the dryer
( I wash all my covers with my baby's regular laundry on warm and then hang them to dry always)
Hope this helps someone.
Kellina (SAHMama to 7 precious gifts!) |
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