To hate my heat pump tumble drier? *title edited by MNHQ at OP's request*

[MarkRuffaloCrumble]

After reading on here how amazing they are, I sold my trusty old £20 Facebook marketplace tumble dryer and bought a fancy £400 condenser one, as YOU LOT convinced me it would change my life!

I took the airer to the tip, as apparently you can tumble anything in this bad boy and it won’t shrink or ruin it, so no need for washing hung all over the kitchen.

Well several shrunk t shirts and many creased loads of sheets later I’m thoroughly pissed off with it and would happily swap it for my old £20 one. I could have cried when I got my new white hotel style bed linen out to put on the bed tonight and it looks like a screwed up tissue . I HATE ironing even more than having washing hung up all over the place - this thing was supposed to make my life easier, not make me hours of extra work by having to iron it all.

What am I doing wrong?

I'm afraid you listened to the wrong people. Tumble dryers should be large and vented, and you need an airer as well for things that shouldn't be tumbled.

Afaik sheets always crease if they're pure cotton (moreso if linen). It's a choice between creases or poly cotton, I fear.

Stop the dryer early and hang.

My LG even has a setting to do this automatically for you.

It seems to utterly destroy knicker elastic though

I have a condenser dryer and haven't shrunk anything in 10 years. Sheets are polycotton. Pure cotton bedding does crease really badly so I don't buy it.

There are some clothes we don't put in the dryer, however - I always check the labels.

@ErrolTheDragon

I'm afraid you listened to the wrong people. Tumble dryers should be large and vented, and you need an airer as well for things that shouldn't be tumbled.

Afaik sheets always crease if they're pure cotton (moreso if linen). It's a choice between creases or poly cotton, I fear.

Yeah, condensers exist more because we don't have much ducting room in UK houses and its much easier to plumb a drain pipe than a sealed duct that will want to grow mold if its not short enough to heat up and dry each use.

Wastes more water cooling the condenser too than the vented type

Use it on the cooler or delicate setting!

We had a condenser dryer left when we moved in to a house. I still had my old vented dryer and after a few weeks of trying the condenser I had a vent put in and sold the condenser.

Yep, we got rid of ours and splashed out on a condenser about 10 years ago. I didn't realise you had to leave a window open or all the utility walls would be dripping, we may as well have stuck with the old hose hanging out of the window.
Then 5 years in found it was on a recall list. They exchanged it like for like so now it's going to live even longer.
Takes ages to dry clothes, they're always damp, then you put them on again and clothes come out singeing, work shirts come out like concertinas, trousers like drainpipes.
Unfortunately it hasn't burst into flames yet.

I come from a country where pretty much everyone uses vented tumble driers. I have a stacking set as we live in an apartment. I also have an Ikea rack bolted the the wall above our second bathroom, over the tub. It folds back. I use that for things that don't go in the dryer.

I have used condenser driers in the UK and in all honesty thought they were not much good. Too small and took too long. Also everything was wrinkled. Very wrinkled.

Our dryer has many settings so it isn't just blasting hot all the time. It also senses when clothes are dry.

I wish I could dry clothes outside but it is not allowed on our balcony. I sometimes sneak a few things out and hang them low down so they are not visible.

Yes, venting is often easier said than done unfortunately.
We put our dryer in the garage by the side door and got a cat flap put in for the vent hose. It works well, but we were lucky we had a space near enough to the door.

Ours seems to have two settings for things that it thinks are dry:

1. Still wet, with bonus steam burns

1. Bone dry, crispy, wrinkles, also so hot it's painful to touch

Unfortunately we have a back yard the size of a single bed and because it's a badly extended, ancient single glazed house with tiny stupidly placed radiators washing would take a week to dry in winter so it's all we've got. Nowhere to put a vented one even if we could (rented), sadly. I tend to try and catch washing at slightly damp and then hang it all off the back of chairs/the banisters/whatever I can to let them get rid of the steam without turning to cardboard.

I agree with a PP - it does wreck knicker elastic too!

I have a heated airer now, but I liked my condenser dryer when I had it. Like anything, there are good and bad ones. Mine was a B efficiency (good for a condenser dryer) Beko.

I got rid of it partly because tumble drying wears your clothes out faster, and partly because of energy use (so both environmental concerns). But nothing shrank in it (I don't have fancy clothes though).

I've had a condenser dryer for 12 yrs now, never shrunk anything yet.
Are you using the correct programme and reading the care instructions?

@rosiejaune

I have a heated airer now, but I liked my condenser dryer when I had it. Like anything, there are good and bad ones. Mine was a B efficiency (good for a condenser dryer) Beko.

I got rid of it partly because tumble drying wears your clothes out faster, and partly because of energy use (so both environmental concerns). But nothing shrank in it (I don't have fancy clothes though).

Are those heated airers any good?

No! I bought one and I’ve had to put it in the garage because it’s huge. I have the cover for it and a pair of jeans can take 18 hours to dry

How strange. I have a condenser dryer and it's wonderful and don't have the issues you talk about.
However, it's a condenser one because I can't vent so need to collect the water instead. The utility room is tiny, there is a window which I leave open and the door shut, there is no steam or wet walls.

The dryer has several settings so very delicate items can have a gentle cool dry whereas heavy cotton needs more heat. When the cycle is finished it has a cool cycle at the end so that there are very few creases, nothing comes out screwed up.

It isn't an expensive machine, a cheap Beko, but brilliant, I wouldn't be without it. I'd say all tumble dryers tend to shrink stuff though, mine doesn't massively but over time T-shirts tend to tighten their fibres and so shrink down a bit.

We mainly use our vented machine on just the basic timer, for 30 or 60 mins, because you can set it to low heat. We ignore all the more complicated automatic programmes. I think they heat things up more and therefore cause more shrinkage. We also have quite a lot of clothes that we don't tumble, especially women's tops.

Creased sheets don't worry me, they stretch out on the bed. Jersey or brushed cotton sheets, or teddy fleece duvets, would be more forgiving.

Also need to make sure it's not overloaded.
My wash cycle takes 8kg but dryer only 5kg
Needs more space to be tossed about.

My experience of tumble dryers is the same as yours and I only tumble dry things in winter when needs must.

One of my little pleasures this week has been the return of line drying weather. I put very little of my clothes in the dryer because most of them seem to shrink, but DPs t shirts seem to survive OK.

I'm baffled about the people who tumble dry by choice, even when they could line dry or use an airer. And there's no way on this earth I'd use horrible polycotton bedding for ease of tumble drying.

I had a condenser dryer for years and didn't come across this, it sounds like it's on too high a setting? Have you got it set to switch off automatically when the clothes are dry?

Having said that I don't have a tumble dryer at all now. The house I live in now has a pulley on the utility room ceiling, also room for an airer in the utility room and a clothes line! All my laundry dreams have come true!

I think you have it on the wrong setting. My condenser drier is no smaller than a vented one either.

Heat pump dryer is what you need. Ours isn’t vented at all as no need to, all plumbed in to drain so no emptying needed.
Super king size bedding is dry within an hour.

We also have various wool settings for it, but I don’t trust dryers and wool so delicates are always hung up

Did you get a heat pump? Old school condenser tumble driers are crap. They don't work well so rely on heat which shrinks clothes. Vented are better but will still shrinks things if you leave them in there until "bone" dry.

You need to use them properly. Heat pump are best, but generally you want to use a tumble drier long and slow on a lower heat, not short & hot.

If things are coming out creased you are a) filling the drum much too full and b) overdoing it. High thread count cotton does crease terribly, you need to remove it when still a whisker damp and hang or iron.

Oh and certain items aren't suitable for tumble driers.

Knickers and socks shrink like mad, never put leggings or woollens in. Read your washing labels.

Are those heated airers any good?

No. I've got one. I got sick of picking up my washing off it to find it had wet and dry stripes. I found it didn't work well even when covered.

1. Don’t overfill
2. Don’t have it on high heat

I dry my 100% cotton super king sheet, pillowcases and duvet cover separately.
It’s a faff but no creases.
The sheets/ pillowcases go in one load, the duvet cover in a second load. Each load doesn’t take long to dry. 20 min max.