laundry bar soap

[fireweed]

I spent some time researching how to make soap specifically for laundry, as I would like to find out if there is something more effective than my hand soap for stain removal. I work around bicycles a lot and my uniform is a white polo shirt!! The hand soap works surprisingly well, but so many recipes for laundry soap call for Fels Naptha which has a bit of a rep for having dodgy ingredients...

Is there a thread here about this? I searched but didn't find one-- am I looking in the right place? Anyone else here interested in laundry soap?

Is "lye soap" what people use for laundry-- it seems weird, as all soap has lye, but do people use lye heavy soap for cleaning? The lye soap recipes I found online are just basic hand soap recipes (except one, which had the decimal point in the wrong place, and called for ten times the amount of lye that would be normally in scale with the other ingredients-- I ran it through a calculator!)

I did find the thread about making it all in one large bucket with lard, but as I live in the UK with limited space for really large buckets, I must find a good laundry bar recipe-- I think I will go with the flow and just make a lard soap with 25% coconut with no SF. I suppose it won't be a big deal if it's a tad lye heavy, as I don't intend on using it for skin contact...

 

[Vic1963]

My mamaw made old fashion soap and used it for laundry..

It had Lard, borax, and even sugar in it. But it was really lye heavy.

My mom always said it would take the hair off a cats back...lol. But it worked. I remember staying with her, and her bed sheets always smelled so clean...and it was the soap we were smelling.

I tried making her recipe HP and it was kind of crumbly....and really harsh.

If you do really lye heavy soap...I would do CP and not HP.

 

[Bigmoose]

My mamaw made old fashion soap and used it for laundry..

It had Lard, borax, and even sugar in it. But it was really lye heavy.

Borax will nutralize lye. I was going to try to make a stain stick with it but had to cancel that idea.

Bruce

 

[Vic1963]

I have seen several of the old recipes have borax in them. Mamaws recipe only had like 1 TBL in it.

I do not personally use it.......BUT i did when trying to create her recipe.

Needless to say, that whole batch of soap, now lives in the garage out on our farm. Maybe the mice will eat it and bubble over dead. hahah.

Vickey

 

[BakingNana]

I read once on someone's site that any homemade soap works for laundry as long as it isn't superfatted. I've been making my own laundry detergent for years (using other people's soap up until now!). I always use either a 100% lard or a pure Castile soap, grated and mixed with 1 c. washing soda and 1 c. borax. I like a few drops of EO in it, also. I find that with my husband's dirty shirts, a toothbrush run across a bar of 100% lard soap is all I've needed to prescrub any grime. It's amazing how white lard soap gets my whites. I have a front loader, so use only 1/8 c. of my powder per load, and use plain white vinegar in the fabric softener dispenser (both to eliminate soap scum and to help keep the plumbing pipes clean; a potential problem if using soap for laundry). I'll never go back to commercial laundry detergents. I love the way my laundry comes out--so clean and fresh smelling. Not to mention the savings.

 

[ChrissyB]

I have made soap for Laundry with 100%Coconut/0% Superfat. It works great and I use it for most cleaning jobs around the place.
Mike in PDX had a great laundry soap recipe around here somewhere that he used kerosene in (works great for greasy stains).
I'll see if I can find it.

 

[fireweed]

Thanks for the replies BN and Chrissy-- how much vinegar do you use? Do you add vinegar at the beginning of the wash every time or just every once in a while?

I think petroleum is what is in Fels Naptha, can't quite remember... I would love to come up with something that's especially good for grease stains as I work with bicycles a lot with my job and my uniform is a white polo shirt!!

And does tallow do the same trick as lard? I mainly use tallow as well as CO (about 3:4)

 

[ChrissyB]

Tallow will give you a harder bar than lard.
A Coconut/Tallow bar with zero superfat will make a great laundry soap. I believe that eucalyptus oil gets greasy stains out too.
Have a look on etsy, there are some sellers on there that make laundry sticks (laundry soap cut into sticks), so that you can just rub some of the wet soap stick onto the stain.

 

[fireweed]

Yes, I've been using my tallow/co soap for laundry and it seems to work-- only just started applying the bar directly. I suppose lard soap would have the advantage here in it's relative softness.

I'm thinking of buying a carbolic soap for my bike greased clothes... was it here that the biodeisel guy is... I think I will search him out now!

 

[MikeInPdx]

Thanks for the replies BN and Chrissy-- how much vinegar do you use? Do you add vinegar at the beginning of the wash every time or just every once in a while?

I think petroleum is what is in Fels Naptha, can't quite remember... I would love to come up with something that's especially good for grease stains as I work with bicycles a lot with my job and my uniform is a white polo shirt!!

And does tallow do the same trick as lard? I mainly use tallow as well as CO (about 3:4)

Fels Naptha contains what they call Stoddard Solvent (mineral spirits). The petroleum oil binds and dissolves the oily stain so the soap can wash it away. I used to buy the mineral spirits at the art supply store until I found out that kerosene degreases as well. It's much cheaper and I don't mind the smell on a couple of small spots.....it's gone by the end of the rinse cycle.

Tallow, lard, even palm combined with coconut all make wonderful laundry soap....you should be good to go.

 

[BakingNana]

I agree with all of the above. As for the vinegar, I use it in every load just filling up my Maytag softener dispenser. I don't want any soap scum left on my darks, especially. Again, I have a front loader so amounts are smaller than a top loader. There is not only no vinegar smell in the wash, it also doesn't seem to interfere with any EO I've used. And I also use FelsNaptha if it is a greasy stain. Works wonders. I know some people freak because of the ingredients in Fels, but I don't use that much so it sure doesn't bother me! I even have a container of my usual powder recipe using Fels for any particularly greasy/nasty loads.

 

[xyxoxy]

I tried Mike's no shred laundry recipe in the Recipe's and Tutorial forums and I either did something wrong or got impatient the first time.
I just began my second attempt which seems to be going much better.
I really like this recipe for it's simplicity and low cost.

I'm just using an old plastic Rubbermaid pitcher that I use for other soapmaking projects so it doesn't take up much room. And if you read through the thread you will see lots of alternative options including subbing coconut for lard.

I am not using kerosene or any degreaser... I just wanna see how the basic lard recipe works first. I'll update that thread in a few days with my results.

I've already been using vinegar as a rinse with my store bought laundry soap for a while now and wouldn't use anything else.

 

[BakingNana]

I know...isn't vinegar amazing? Hope no one uses chlorine bleach with it, tho!

 

[fireweed]

Thanks again for the info-- so you just rub kerosene onto the stain and throw it into the wash as usual? Even on a white shirt? How exciting if that's all it takes!

And what about vinegar, just white? I can only find malt vinegar in containers over 500 ml :0

xy, what happened in your first attempt?

Laundry soap is so rewarding, and a great way to use up some soap...

 

[xyxoxy]

And what about vinegar, just white? I can only find malt vinegar in containers over 500 ml :0

xy, what happened in your first attempt?

Laundry soap is so rewarding, and a great way to use up some soap...

I have only used white vinegar... I get it in a 5 litre bottle. I don't know that other vinegars would be bad.

In my first attempt I used the basic no-shred lard recipe adding borax and baking soda (instead of washing soda). I knew they were different but thought it would still work. After 4 days the "white goop" had only incorporated about 1/3 of the water. I suppose it was slowly working but I gave up.

The current attempt with washing soda has incorporated over 90% of the water after only 3 days so I suppose the baking soda did have a negative impact.

I like the no-shred recipe because I don't usually have leftover soap that I need to use up except for one or two batches that had too much colorant (which I don't want to use for laundry).