Homemade Laundry Soap: result & cost!

[Glutton4...]

Well, I finally did it - made my own (septic tank-friendly) Laundry Soap, from a recipe found on/via this forum. I decided to test it yesterday, on a whites wash. White poly-cotton shirt, cotton socks, some old stained tea towels and a pair of pillow-cases. Result? Very very favourable - even Mr.G was impressed with how white the old tea towels have come up!

I bought the ingredients in bulk, on eBay, and have now sat and worked out the costs, and they are as follows;

1 x 130g bar Sunlight Soap = £2.16
236g Washing Soda Crystals = 82.3p
236g Bicarbonate of Soda = 47.9p

This makes a 7.5 Litre batch, which is 64 x half-cup doses @ just under 5.5 PENCE per wash load!

That's me converted!

[Jeanied]

Sounds good to me!

Any chance you could re-post the recipe?

[zazen999]

AKA Gloop. Brilliant stuff.

[Glutton4...]

Yeah - Laundry Gloop - I like it!

1 x 130g bar Sunlight Soap = £2.16
236g Washing Soda Crystals = 82.3p
236g Bicarbonate of Soda = 47.9p

It's really simple. The 'recipe' I had was for 5.5 oz bar soap and 1 Cup each of Soda and Bicarb. I could only buy 4.5 oz bars, so adjusted accordingly. 1 Cup is 283g/10oz in weight or half a pint of liquid.

Chop up the soap (Lemon one smells so good you could almost eat it!) and dissolve it in hot water. It takes ages to dissolve, so I used my hand blender, as it went quite stringy. Then dissolve the dry ingredients into some water, mix the two, and top-up with water to 7.5 Litres. If you are using the bigger quantities, it's 10 Litres per batch.

I use a B&Q orange bucket, and have measured out and marked my 7.5 L batch level on the side with indelible marker. I store it in plastic 4 pint Milk containers (In the cupboard under the sink - not in the fridge, as it would be a nasty shock! ) Each 4 pint container gives me sixteen wash loads.

Zaz, would you mind re-posting on here, what you top up your washing-up iquid with, as I can't seem to find it, and would like to try that too. Similarly, if anyone else has any tried and tested Shampoo recipes, I'd be very interested.

Happy Days!

[chris]

Hmm, sounds interesting. Where did you find the original info? Here or elsewhere? Be interested to read to see how well it works on re-usable nappies (we use them - our washing machine is on the go constantly with nappies in it!).

We tried soap nuts, but they were crap.

[Glutton4...]

I originally came across it in here, somewhere, but couldn't find it again after a quick search. One of 'us' is a member of another forum, and posted a link, and I adapted the recipe from that. The original recipe had Borax in it, which I don't want to use.

Give it a try, Chris. Even if you only buy one bar of soap and small amounts of the other two ingredients, just for one batch (less than £3.50 a batch for me!), at least it won't break the bank!

[zazen999]

Zaz, would you mind re-posting on here, what you top up your washing-up liquid with, as I can't seem to find it, and would like to try that too. Similarly, if anyone else has any tried and tested Shampoo recipes, I'd be very interested.

Happy Days!

Washing up liquid? Mine gets diluted with water!

Washing liquid - I used to use liquid/gloop but changed a couple of years back to the balls and I alternate between the balls and 1/2 a tablet [when they say use 2 tabs, I use 1/2 of one and it does the same job]....I found that liquid did get stuck in the machine and I was having to do a boil wash every now and then to clear it out.

I might go back to gloop when this packet of tabs runs out - they usually last me a year and I buy them on offer.

In the past, I've also used Fairy liquid and half and half-ed it with gloop - and when the container is half full; add more gloop and continue half and halfing it until all the fairy smell goes; and then start again.

[Glutton4...]

Washing up liquid? Mine gets diluted with water! ... In the past, I've also used Fairy liquid and half and half-ed it with gloop ...

Ahhhh - you meant Fairy Laundry liquid, and I thought you meant Washing-up liquid - D'oh!

I have added a little of my Laundry Gloop to the last inch of washing-up liquid in the bottle as an experiment.

[chris]

So do I lol

[Glutton4...]

So do I lol

What!?

[Two_Sheds]

I found that liquid did get stuck in the machine

When our washing machine started stinking I researched online and was told repeatedly never to use liquid in the washing machine as it boggers them up

[zazen999]

When our washing machine started stinking I researched online and was told repeatedly never to use liquid in the washing machine as it boggers them up

Exactly....although gloop was not quite as bad as the purchased liquids..........mainly as it was watered down probably.

[chris]

What!?

I meant so did i

[Ananke]

I bought Borax substitute and Soda Crystals yesterday and I have bicarb in the cupboard so i'm going to have a go at this.

Does anyone have the original recipe?

[cptncrackoff]

When our washing machine started stinking I researched online and was told repeatedly never to use liquid in the washing machine as it boggers them up

When our hotpoint broke, they sent an engineer out under warranty, he said only use powders, as they have added water softeners which prevent limescale build up, and then you dont need to use calgon etc etc if you just use powder.