Cleaning products (on a Saturday, cant you tell the weather is bad)

[e1y1]

Hi,

Just wondering what cleaning products you use all around your home and why?

E.G. what brands etc. Does anyone find the whole range of Cif rather caustic and could strip your lungs?

I think I may have a slight thing for cleaning products I seem to have accumalated a few (although only get them on offer, never full price) I find some I use regularly and some stay in the garage forever.

Just wondering what other peoples cleaning arsenal is?

Thanks

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Oh, I looooove cleaning products! I like cleaning products the way some women love shoes or nail polish.

I used to be a lab tech at Proctor & Gamble's headquarters in Cincinnati, and I was so impressed by what I saw there in terms of product development (seriously, that place was totally fascinating) that I bought stock in the company and I tend to use P&G products in my own home.

I love Fairy (although I hear that Aldi's liquid is slightly better and significantly cheaper). I also love "Flash" - but I'm really only crazy about the bathroom cleaning spray. I love how you can just feel the soap scum dissolving under the cloth as you wipe.

However, supermarket stuff is too expensive for me to use professionally. I can go through several bottles of stuff a week. I still haven't found anything I like as much as Flash Bathroom but I'm going to try.

I like Cillit Bang for kitchens - it cuts through grease well. However, I have bought a professional product that is highly concentrated and has a very high pH so it should be really good as a degreaser. It's about £8 for 5 litres and dilutes something like 20 ml per liter of water, so I think that's 250 litres of degreaser. It can be more or less dilute depending on how tough the job is.

The professional stuff I buy is called Jangro. There's a warehouse/distributor near me, and that's why I buy their stuff. I'm sure there are other manufacturers that are as good, but they're close, they have decent prices, and I like their catalog/web site because I like to look up the chemical product info of what I'm buying.

For cleaning soap scum in showers, I use a thick gel called "Washroom descaler and cleaner." It's very highly acidic. I only use it when showers have a lot of build-up on them.

I also got a neutral general cleaner that comes in 5 liter jugs for about £8. It dilutes something like 50ml per 5 liters, so I think it makes something like 250 liters of general cleaner. You can make it more concentrated for dirtier jobs. I use this instead of that Flash general/floor cleaner that comes in big jugs. It's also good for cleaning windows, at a very low concentration.

Window cleaner is something I just love as a general hard surface cleaner, but it's bloody expensive. Concentrated windscreen cleaner is much cheaper. But, I'm just going to use the general cleaner mentioned above.

I like Bar Keeper's Friend for when I want to scrub with a paste. I never use ... um, what is it called in this country? Those scouring powders that you shake out of a can. To much trouble to rinse off. But, BKF is good for stained sinks and suchlike.

I've been told that a general cheap cream cleaner is good for stainless steel (the bane of my existence) and I am going to give that a try.

Ever tried Star Drops? It's a good, general cheap cleaner that pretty much does everything. I won't use it professionally because of the cost, but I have a bottle under my sink.

[minkembra]

The pink stuff. cleans anything doesn't smell.

Bicarbonate for tricky things. like the hob.

wd40 and baby wipes for when the kids use crayon on walls :-(
baby wipes clean a worrying range of stuff...it's a wonder they out them anywhere near babies faces without it cleaning their expression off.

these are the things I might use...if I did any cleaning

[minkembra]

out put

[e1y1]

katy I bet that was interesting, would love to see somewhere like that and see what actually happens in the creating of cleaning products. Funny you should mention BKF - my Mum used to use that all the time, I have honestly never bought it.

mink do you mean the pink paste type thing in a pink tub, again my Mum used to buy that and I never have (I think i'm too sucked into the main commercialised cleaners - Flash, Cif etc.) I will have to start looking at all these other things I never even look at. You're right about baby wipes - the amount of times I have dropped pasta/beans chips covered in sauce on my sofa and a baby wipe has got it right out of the fabric.

Thanks for the tips :)

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

e1y1 It was awesome! They had all these things they'd test. Like, I did a lot of stuff for laundry products. They had this huge laundrette/laboratory where you could set a computer to control things about the water to mimic the water conditions of anywhere in the world (minerals, hardness, etc). And they'd do things like make cloth dingy using a very specific formula of precisely measured ingredients (grease, clay, etc) and then use them to test whitening agents by photographing them with special cameras that could measure how much light was reflected.

And there were all these rooms at different temperatures so you could test how long products would remain stable in storage in hot or cold conditions. And they had this one room that shook up and down like the back of a lorry to test how products settled.

We'd do things like churn detergent into water in a special chamber, then time how long the bubbles lasted with a stopwatch. There would be all these people applying precise measurements of grease to dishes and then soaking them in different solutions and then measuring exactly how much grease was left. Man, it was just amazing. And always interesting.

[Ponders]

Aldi Power Force pink grapefruit general purpose cleaner is AMAZING

it cuts through grease better than anything else I've ever tried, doesn't froth up so wipes clean easily (with a wet Aldi Power Force microfibre cloth ) & doesn't smell of chemicals

it's fantastic for things like moulded cupboard doors - which I have the misfortune to own - also tiles & grouting & really anything that isn't a dead flat surface

& it's only 79p a bottle

brilliant

[Ponders]

oh, that Fairy Power Spray is pretty much unbeatable for baked-on-blackness - that plus a steel scourer will shift almost anything.

& one of those mould & mildew sprays for - er - mould & mildew. It's expensive though, & it's basically just dilute chlorine bleach, so you could probably make up a solution of bleach+water in a spray bottle

[Ponders]

I do mine with the Aldi pink stuff & a soft sink brush, smallpeople - then wipe down with the wet microfibre cloth.

They are completely greaseless afterwards.

It's fabulous

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Ponders, I can beat it: oven cleaning gel. No scrubbing even needed. I have a baking tray that is dark brown/black all over. I just use it for chicken nuggets and I don't really care but one day when I was cleaning my oven, I put some of the left-over gel on it and when I rinsed it, it was shiny silver again.

I've wondered if Dettol Mould (or that HG-something stuff that is even more expensive) is really any different than simply chlorine bleach. That's what it smells like. I just use bleach, myself. But, maybe there's some other ingredient that helps it work or penetrate.

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

What is this Aldi pink stuff? Can you post a link to a picture of it?

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Wait, I've bought a lavender Powerforce general cleaner - it's sort of like Flash, meant to be diluted for floors. Is the pink grapefruit better or just a different scent?

[e1y1]

katy sounds ace, suppose as consumers we don't think of what goes into a product when we just throw it in the trolley.

ISee Yes, love the Method range. Especially the smell, exactly like you say with the almond one. I just don't get to buy that often as my Tesco only stock 2 of their products, I have to use Ocado as they have by far the widest range but I don't do my normal shop there, so can only get it when I do the odd one shop there (which nearly ends up consisting entirely of cleaning products ).

[Ponders]

oooh, I have some of that, I'll try it next time, Katy - thanks!

I just read the label on my bottle of Dettol mould remover - active ingredient is 2.5% "sodium hypochlorite"

complete ingredient list from their website:

Aqua
Sodium Hypochlorite
Sodium Hydroxide
Lauramine Oxide
Parfum

so I'd guess that water plus a splash of chlorine bleach should do the same job pretty much?

[e1y1]

ponders off to Aldi I go

[Ponders]

the pink grapefruit is a spray bottle, Katy - I'm guessing your lavender stuff is in a pouring bottle. It'll be a different formulation I would think.

can't find cleaning stuff on their website so no link, but it'll be in the same part of the shop as the flash-type liquid

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Well, the Sodium Hydroxide is drain cleaner, and that may do something. I'm thinking it may break down the actual fungal matter that bleach has killed (and whitened to invisibility).

I'm thinking maybe I'll buy some Dettol and do a side-by-side comparison when I'm next confronted with a moldy shower.

[Ponders]

oh definitely give it a go, e1y1

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Ponders, I see what you mean. Hmmm... that sounds really good.

I can't justify buying it, though, as I've got 250 litres of degreaser already! (Well, five litres of concentrate.)

[Ponders]

Sodium Hypochlorite is liquid bleach
Sodium Hydroxide is caustic soda
Lauramine Oxide is a surfactant (aka detergent, emulsifier, wetting agent, foaming agent, softener, milling agent, dyeing auxiliary, sterilizing agent or antistatic agent)



I probably will go on buying the Dettol stuff (although the spray nozzle always dribbles, mostly all over my hand )

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

I do remember the nozzle being dribbly!

[herewegoloubylou]

Katy, you are funny. Would you like to come round my house and clean a bit? (Plenty to do...)

[KatyTheCleaningLady]

Hah! I've got more than enough to do, here!