Laundry Soap

[NameThatCandy]

Hi there,

I want to make my own laundry soap, do you have any good recipe?

Thanks

 

[Chay]

Laundry Soap

Bar of soap, grated
½ cup washing soda
½ cup Borax powder
You will also need a small bucket, about 2 gallon size

Grate the soap and put it in a sauce pan.
Add 6 cups water and heat it until the soap melts.
Add the washing soda and the borax and stir until it is dissolved.
Remove from heat.
Pour 4 cups hot water into the bucket.
Now add your soap mixture and stir.
Now add 1 gallon plus 6 cups of water and stir.
Let the soap sit for about 24 hours and it will gel.
You use ½ cup per load.

This recipe = 64 loads

Laundry Powder

All measures by weight.
1 pound, very dry, grated cold process soap
8 oz. washing soda
8 oz. borax
Essential oil - ½ oz

Mix dry ingredients in large bowl with gloved hand.
Add essential oil by sprinkling on top. Mix again and dispense into containers.
For light loads, use 2 tablespoons; for sheets or heavy laundry, use 1/4 cup.

This recipe = 40 light loads or 20 heavy loads

These are the recipes I use. I never use store bought laundry detergent. But please keep in mind that your results will differ based not only on the type of soap you start out with, but also on your water.

 

[NameThatCandy]

When u said "bar of soap", is it CP soaps I made?

 

[Chay]

It is my personal experience that soap made of 100% lard works the best. Just like making your different kinds of soap you should experiment and find what works best with your water. Something else to keep in mind is if you have a front end loader you'll want to make sure to use a low sudsing soap.

 

[Guest]

Laundry Soap

Bar of soap, grated
½ cup washing soda
½ cup Borax powder
You will also need a small bucket, about 2 gallon size

Grate the soap and put it in a sauce pan.
Add 6 cups water and heat it until the soap melts.
Add the washing soda and the borax and stir until it is dissolved.
Remove from heat.
Pour 4 cups hot water into the bucket.
Now add your soap mixture and stir.
Now add 1 gallon plus 6 cups of water and stir.
Let the soap sit for about 24 hours and it will gel.
You use ½ cup per load.

This recipe = 64 loads

i've been making my own laundry soap for several months now and haven't used store bought stuff in a long darn time now.

I started with the above recipe as a starting point, but the down side is that it's sorta slimy noodly stuff and you need to stir well or shake well before using because it seperates. And I have many other things to do rather than shake my laundry soap before each load. And with a family of 5 and two are kids that seem to need to change 5 times a day.

But it's not a very nice consistency to work with.

I have read where the powder version doesn't dissolve in cold water, so i don't use that. Since I wash most of the laundry here in cold water just to save on $$$. (call me thrifty) Borax does NOT dissolve in cold water at all, and it needs to be boiling water to dissolve actually. So why use a product that needs to dissolve to work and since it doesn't in cold water i'm just not going to waste my money or time on it.


Mine that I make turns out to be a nice gel consistency. But i'm working hard to tweak it even more........ To make it more user friendly. :shock:

I just wanted to share that about the above recipes that are on the net so many times if i had a penny for every time it was posted i'd be a millionaire. LOL



But the one thing I love about using my own laundry soap is that it cleans better, but it rinses cleaner. My rinse water is actually doing what it's supposed to do rather than try to remove all the extra crap that the laundry detergent companies put in. Right down to the foaming agents they add just because the consumer expect to see foam. They don't think it's working unless they see soap bubbles during the wash cycle.

But I"m a sucker for my liquid downy (I don't care for the dryer sheets cause the waxes used to make them block the dryer vents which can cause dryer fires) And I find now that i make my own laundry soap i can actually use 1/2 the amount of liquid downy and the scent is very strong in my dried laundry and still get the benefits of using a liquid fabric softener. And I love to smell the scent of my fabric softener in my clothes, especially bedding..... Nothing beats crawling between clean sheets and smelling that fresh downy..... Anywho i just wanted to share that I get away with using 1/2 the amount of fabric softener because my clothes rinse cleaner and well, it just seems to work that way for me......

 

[Guest]

It is my personal experience that soap made of 100% lard works the best. Just like making your different kinds of soap you should experiment and find what works best with your water. Something else to keep in mind is if you have a front end loader you'll want to make sure to use a low sudsing soap.

I do make bars of soap from lard or rather 1/2 lard and 1/2 crisco and water but I use them as stain sticks and they totally rock and work better than any other stain remover from the store.

I just keep a small mist bottle filled with water near and an old toothbrush. And I mist the stain, rub the bar of lard soap and brush with the old toothbrush. Let it sit a bit and wash as usual. And i've gotten out old stains with this method!!!


But if you have a front loading machine or a newer HE machine even if you use your bar of soap that has high suds the amount that acutally goes into your machine won't even enough to cause a problem. So you can use your favorite soap if you want.

But many use coconut oil made soap and i"m not sure why because that causes more soap scum which isn't something I desire in my machine.... So that's just a thought.........

But the soap recipe that I use does have some coconut oil in it but not a whole lot........

 

[campbellsoap]

Here is a website I found http://www.soapnuts.com/laundry.html I have plans to make 100% lard soap and I've already bought my borax and washing soda.

Good luck let us know how yours work out and I will let you know how mine works out.

jackie

 

[Guest]

For any others reading this, don't confuse washing soda with baking soda they are NOT the same and can't be interchanged.


Sometimes arm & hammer washing soda can be hard to find......
I know i can't find it in any local grocery stores or super stores anywhere close to where i live. I've looked everywhere.

So here is another tip..... Sometimes it's called Soda Ash OR Sodium Carbonate


BUT before you start looking online for a source to buy it you can look at your local super store such as wal-mart, k-mart or target. Or even a pool supply store if you have one near you.... Why you may ask..... Because Sodium Carbonate is used to change the pH of pools, and you can find it with the pool chemicals....... So read the labels of those products and find the one your looking for. It's main ingredient will be like 98% Sodium Carbonate or something alone those lines. The one to increase the pH of your pool, I believe if my memory serves me correctly. So you might save a few bucks on shipping buy buying it local. And in the summer time stock up if you use a lot of it when super stores have their pool supplies on sale!!!!

 

[Lane]

But the soap recipe that I use does have some coconut oil in it but not a whole lot........

I can not recal if you have posted it or not, but what is your laundry recipe, if ya dont mind sharing? (and saveonscents.com has an AMAZING downy FO!)

 

[Guest]

I haven't posted my recipe, because it's one that I created on my own that is completely different than any others posted on the net that I found. But I don't use bar soaps.

But I am working on another version that doesn't use much liquid for a more concentrated version, and you can use even less laundry soap, but it still dissolves in cold water.

Since borax needs to be dissolved in boiling water to get the most out of it........... To get borax to dissolve you need to use boiling water, and add the borax and stir and soon the liquid will turn crystal clear. And then you know it's dissolved and will work. Otherwise it just settles to the bottom and does nothing....... So it's not worth wasting your money on if it's not going to do the job.

I love working on new projects and tweaking this and that to make the most of my product.

 

[mcleodnaturals]

Since borax needs to be dissolved in boiling water to get the most out of it........... To get borax to dissolve you need to use boiling water, and add the borax and stir and soon the liquid will turn crystal clear. And then you know it's dissolved and will work. Otherwise it just settles to the bottom and does nothing....... So it's not worth wasting your money on if it's not going to do the job.

do you use borax in the initial mixture and let it dissolve in boiling water, then add it into your laundry soap or do you just not use it at all? did that even make sense!?! :shock:

thx kelly

 

[IanT]

Is it possible to make a non-borax laundry soap???

 

[Ladybug Soapworks]

Soap Naturally has a recipe for laundry gel that uses a soap made from olive and palm oil and then lots of water to make the gel. No washing soda or anything other than the soap. Unless you want to add in so EOs. I am going to make the soap tonight and the laundry gel tomorrow!

 

[IanT]

OhhH!! lwet me know how it turns out!! do you have a link to that recipe by any chance!?!

 

[Ladybug Soapworks]

soap naturally is a book. I do have the recipe but I think it may be illegal to post it since it is a book and must be copyrighted
The book is awesome though so i highly recommend it to everyone. You can only get it here: http://www.annelees.com/books/ in the USA.

 

[gallerygirl]

this thread comes at a perfect time for me. I have been thinking of making my own laundry soap, then our churchs' greenteam sent out a flier today with ideas on how we can become more green and one of the suggestions was making your own laundry soap. Thanks for all the info here everyone! k

 

[IanT]

no worries, I might try to get that book then

 

[Nanditasr]

Ladybug Soapworks: This website http://www.annelees.com/books/ no longer exists. :-( I also googled the book, and I got their legacy website -- http://www.soap-naturally.com/ -- and they say the book is now out of print. :-(

 

[shunt2011]

Ladybug Soapworks: This website http://www.annelees.com/books/ no longer exists. :-( I also googled the book, and I got their legacy website -- http://www.soap-naturally.com/ -- and they say the book is now out of print. :-(

This post is from 2008. The op hasn’t been here in a long time.

Welcome, please be sure to read the forum stickies and rules.

 

[Zany_in_CO]

I used to use that powder recipe. Everything came out clean and bright at first, but after about 6 months or so, my whites started looking gray and dingy. Using less soap and 1/4 cup white vinegar in the rinse cycle cleared up that problem. The other problem was that the underwear elastic was losing it's elasticity. When someone on another group mentioned that was due to the Borax, I stopped adding it and subbed baking soda. But that was a long time ago.

Now I use 100% coconut oil LS and OxyClean. I use the measuring cup that comes with OxyClean and the cup that comes with the re-purposed bottle of Purex liquid laundry soap that holds the coconut oil LS. I still do the white vinegar in the rinse. It's really important to get all the soap scum out for really clean fresh laundry. When folding clothes out of the dryer I feel like I'm doing a commercial... I really like the way my laundry feels and smells. So clean, so fresh, so just very excellent.

Oh, and I also use any batches of LS that I have on hand for towels and bed linens. Even the LS that doesn't have coconut oil in it does a very good job.