Washing at 40 or cold is not a good idea

[Stangerthings]

There is an advert for washing clothes in cold water. I think this is wrong. I washed a load of towels at 40 degrees and had to wash them again as they smelled dirty so how is a cold wash going to remove bacteria?

I started washing bedding and towels at 60 degrees when DD's eczema and asthma was bad. Anything lower than 60 degrees doesn't destroy house dust mites.

Washing at 60 degrees did the trick.

Are you leaving things too long before washing them? I wash mine at 40 and have never had a problem. Maybe your washing machine needs cleaning?

40 isn't even a cold wash - that's just normal temperature! I wash most things on 30. Will wash my cleaning cloths and towels on 60 but that's it.
The smell is probably your washing machine itself rather than the setting. I had a similar problem where everything smelt damp and mouldy when it came out of the machine. Yet when I moved house and had a different machine the smell stopped despite me not doing anything different! So clean your machine, get it serviced or buy a new one!

What are you doing with your towels that they get mouldy?!

We wash hands with soap and water though, don't we?

Did they smell funky before washing? Because if not that makes little sense - if you can’t wash things cold in your washing machine I would hazard a guess that your actual machine isn’t clean.

Towels are a breeding ground for germs because they get wet and take time to dry out after use. They should be washed at a higher temperature than your clothes.

Do..... You not wash you clothes with soap and water?

What is the smell you're noticing, exactly?

I wash my clothes on 30 and towels and bedding on 40, and they come out smelling clean. To be fair, they don't go in smelling particularly dirty!

🤣🤣

I don't know about you, but that's how I wash my clothes and towels as well.

Laundry detergent is just soap for clothes.

If we've learned nothing else from the Covid pandemic, surely we all know that soap/detergent breaks down the lipid membrane of bacteria/viruses. Heat will help, of course.

Er yes But not at a temperature high enough to kill bacteria.

Everything gets done at 30 or 40 here. No issues with smell.

I give zero headspace to bacteria on clothing.

Sure but unless someone in the house has a bug, or would be vulnerable if they caught a bug, you don’t need to destroy every bit of bacteria.

We live with germs all around us and our immune systems need that.

So it’s true you have to wash at 60 or above to destroy all bacteria (or use bleach or anti-bacterial powder) but for most people that is simply not necessary.

Modern detergents are designed to be effective at lower temperatures.

I know! This always puzzles me. Surely towels are the one thing that don’t need high temps for?
What are people doing with their towels that makes them grubbier than socks and knickers?

I suppose if you have really thick towels and no heated towel rack/radiator in the bathroom then they'll take a long time to det but even then... where are all the news reports of leprosy by towel?
What bacteria is breeding on the towels and what illness is that causing?

I've been washing on the "super eco cold wash" feature on my machine for several years. We are all alive and healthy in my house. No towel related diseases here.

My mother always used to say that life begins over 40.

She did do a lot of washing.

I wash towels at 60.

Well, that's the point, isn't it?

You don't need to kill all the bacteria on your clothes, and even if you did, as soon as you put them on again, or put them in your wardrobe, the bacteria would be back on them immediately anyway.

Because soap kills bacteria. We dont needs support hot water. Not for clothes or for hands.

(It doesnt kill everything obviously but we dont need to. It's fine. Really.)

I wash at 30. Only smell if left in machine for too long.

It's like that advert for Dettol (?) where some anxious voice asks whether you have ever thought about bacteria on your - gasp - laundry?? Or the other product which stirs up worries about bacteria on the - heaven forbid - carpet??

Bonkers.