Fels-Naptha Essentially, its a bar of soap made specifically for your laundry. Its a great stain remover and degreaser for your laundry. It can be used by itself directly on to the laundry for stain removal or pre-treatment or grated to make into laundry detergent.
If you have more than one item in the load that is stained, you can put about a cup of shavings (fels naptha) directly into the washer. Use your own judgement according to the size of the load of laundry. This soap also does wonders on your white clothes! Its easier on your clothes and works better than bleach!
Yes, You can use bar soap to wash clothes. I have done it many times, just be sure to adequately rinse all of it from the fabric to prevent streaks of soap in the fabric.
Baking soda, aka sodium bicarbonate, is a naturally occurring substance that can do wonders for your laundry. Having long been used as an eco-friendly alternative to laundry detergent and in other cleaning processes around the home, baking soda is the obvious choice when you've run out of laundry detergent.
No, it's not a good idea. Dishwashing detergent has enzymes and chemicals to dissolve the 3 components of food: fat, carbohydrates and proteins. They will eat away the fabric, especially natural fibers like cotton.
Here are the ingredients of FELS NAPTHA: Soap (sodium tallowate*, sodium cocoate* (or) sodium palmate kernelate*, and sodium palmate*), water, talc, coconut acid*, palm acid*, tallow acid*, PEG-6 methyl ether, glycerin, sorbitol, sodium chloride, pentasodium pentetate and/or tetrasodium etidronate, titanium dioxide, ...
Fels-Naptha®, now part of the Zout® brand family, continues to provide the same robust stain-fighting formula. The formula is the same stain-fighting formula with only slight changes to the fragrance due to the manufacturing process.
Add to the washer: Use 1/2 cup of the mixture per load of laundry in a standard top-load washer. Use only 2 tablespoons in a high-efficiency top or front-load washer.
According to their website, the only difference between their pink, white, and blue soap are the dye colors. In different parts of Mexico, one color is preferred over another.
Bar Soap Options
Most people who make their own laundry soap use fels naptha bar soap. However, it does contain talc so I prefer not to use it. Zote is a popular non-toxic option. I use Castile soap and it works really well plus grates very easily.
Use Laundry Borax or Baking Soda
Place the dry product directly in the washer drum before adding detergent, soiled clothes, and water. If you have no detergent at all, use 1 cup of borax or baking soda for a normal load. Pretreat stains before washing and use the warmest water temperature recommended for the garments.
Though dish soap is great as a stain pretreatment option, it's not meant for direct use in a laundry washing machine. That's because dish soaps are uniquely formulated to break up grease and stuck-on food particles with foamy suds—something you don't want to happen in your washing machine.
Grate bars of soap with a cheese grater. Mix baking soda, soda crystals and soap flakes together in food processor until very fine. If there are a lot of large pebble sized bits of soap I find they stay on your clothes through the wash.
Microwave for 2-3 minutes, and allow them to cool for up to one hour in the microwave. It's so important to leave them be, because not only will the soap be extremely hot, but the strong smell of Fels Naptha will dissipate the longer it's left untouched.
Although vinegar and baking soda are safe to use in both regular and HE washing machines, they are considerably less efficient than high-performance laundry detergents at delivering an outstanding and odorless clean.
“Mix 2 teaspoons of Borax, 4 cups of hot water, 1 teaspoon of Dawn Dish Soap, and 4 tablespoons of vinegar in a spray bottle,” share Crandall and Rosser. Shake well, spray the glass, and let sit for three to five minutes, then wash away with water (a squeegee will wipe away the remaining water).