Recipe for making your own laundry soap
For this recipe you will need the following:
- Bar soap of some kind. I recommend castille soap.
- Pot to melt soap in.
- Water to use for melting
- Heat resistant container to put melted soap in.
- Water to mix with melted soap
- Washing soda
- Dirty clothing to use laundry soap on
There have been numerous recipes that I have seen lately. My favorite so far is listed here. I used Fels Naphtha and found it very harsh on *my* hands, but it makes up a huge amount that is gelatinous(how other recipes describe the end product). Definitely got the clothes clean, but I now use the remaining bar as a stain remover that works wonderfully. Your mileage may vary!
I would highly recommend that you visit the "Margaret"'s home page that is listed at the end of the recipe.
LAUNDRY LIQUID RECIPE
by Margaret Van Emmerick -- Brisbane, Australia
Email: [email protected]
I found the following recipe in an issue of "Soft Technology"
(now ReNew magazine), a publication of the Alternative Technology Association of Australia . I've added some detail
as to mixing and my experiences with it. The concoction saved me the price of the magazine with the first batch, comparing the price of a bucket of the 'goop' with that of a box of the commercial laundry powder I normally bought.
They lasted approximately as long as one another. I have since seen variations of the same recipe from other sources as well, so in all conscience I cannot claim the recipe as my own. I have had quite good success with it and have been using it exclusively for the last three years or so.
Liquid Laundry Soap Recipe
Grate up one cake of yellow or pure laundry soap or one cup of
grated soap ends into a small pot. Add enough *cold* water to 2/3 fill the pot. Heat until all the soap is dissolved, stirring continuously and making sure it doesn't boil over. I had an accidental discovery one time I made up this brew. I had put the cold water in with the grated soap, had mixed it up and then got distracted. several hours later I returned to find that the soap had
got all nice and soft so I heated that and it liquefied really
quickly. Unless I'm in a hurry, I usually do it that way now.
Add the melted soap to one large bucketful of hot water (I use
an old nappy bucket because it also has a lid). Lastly add one cup of washing soda (also known as sal soda) and stir until dissolved. Do not do in reverse order or big gluggy lumps will result which are a pest to try and strain.
The mix cools to a huge gelatinous mess but when mixed up again
looks like soap out of a pump pack. I usually find that my hands are the best tools for mixing it up again, although in the middle of winter this tends to be a little daunting so a potato masher or similar might do instead.
All preparation takes about 15 minutes (unless I let the grated
soap and cold water sit a while first) and costs around 40 cents for an 11 liter bucketful.
I use about 1 liter (4 cups) of soap mix per large (7kg), fairly
dirty load, and about 500 ml (2 cups) for smaller and/or less dirty loads.
There is also a fairly good chance that I am a bit heavy handed with the stuff and could possibly use less. For smaller machines please do consider using less.
While I think of it, this brew does not suds up very much.
Where the water is extremely soft, it may froth up a little.
The mixture is, or should be---depending on the soap that is
used---phosphate free, reducing our impact on the environment.
I usually add a handful of baking soda (bi-carbonate of soda) to
the washing cycle and about a cup of vinegar to the rinse cycle. The baking soda is to assist in the removal of odors from the wash and the vinegar acts as a mild disinfectant, fabric softener and rinse aid. Some people have been concerned about using vinegar in the washing machine. If I remember correctly, it wasn't recommended for enamel bowled machines. It didn't cause
me any difficulties but your mileage may vary.
By the way, washing soda/sal soda and bicarbonate of soda
(baking soda) are NOT one and the same and are NOT interchangeable. Bicarbonate of soda is NaHCO3. Washing soda is Na2CO3.10H2O.
Margaret lives with her husband, Mike, and their pampered cat in
Brisbane, Australia. Margaret's been known to build a set of book
shelves, tile a kitchen, lop trees and a whole host of other things which have usually been undertaken through necessity rather than pleasure in the first instance, but now she finds that she actually enjoys those pursuits. You can visit Margaret online at:
http://home.gil.com.au/~emmerik/