Do you wash towels separately in their own load?

[JacknDiane]

I've always bunged them in with the rest of the washing, am I doing it wrong?

I was them on their own, on a hotter wash with no fabric conditioner.

Everything here gets washed at 40, l would never consider bacteria as a problem.
There's only two of us, towels go in whenever l remember to change them and with any wash to make up a load.

weekly was with undies as get done at 60*.

Separately.
Partly because I use conditioner on our clothes and towels washed with conditioner are horrid.
But mainly because towels will leave a fine layer of fluff on clothes washed with them, especially noticeable on dark clothes.

I do bath towels separately as I have a load after the 3 of us have a shower/bath as my kids are notorious splashers in the bath so I always put 2 big towels on the floor,so 4/5 big towels is a load,if I have tea towels or cloths to go in at the same time I'll do them too.

Is washing at 90 unnecessary then?

60 degrees kills bacteria which is present on towels regardless of how clean the body that it dried are.

60 is hot enough to kill the bacteria.

Could some of the hot wash people explain what they’re worried is happening to their towels that isn’t happening to anything else they’re washing?

From my perspective they’re the cleanest fabric we use. They are used to dry off our thoroughly cleaned bodies immediately after a shower, then left to dry. We don’t have a heated towel rail (and our house is cold) and our towels are always dry by the next day and never smell musty.

If you do a sixty degree wash for your towels, are you also the kind of family that leaves a damp towel in a pile on the floor after use? Unless you’re using the towel like a loofah to scrub dead skin off you when you dry, that’s the only thing I could think that would make me treat them as if they’re dirtier than all my other washing.

In answer to OPs question, yes we mostly wash them separately because they tend to be bulky and need a lower spin cycle.

Always separate as I don’t use fabric conditioner with them and do a hotter wash.

I have explained upthread. My bath towels must be thicker than yours or my bathroom colder, as they don’t dry completely between uses.

I like my towels washed the way they are. This is very much a case of ‘to each his own’, so no real need for your big exposition; I’m not going to change something I’ve been doing for 40 years. The OP asked a question and people are answering.

See this makes sense to me, if someone finds by experience that towels washed at 60 get less smelly because in her house they don’t dry out properly between uses (in ours they go on heated towel rail so are always dry and warm when reused, I realise what a luxury that is!)
What doesn’t make sense is the idea that it’s unhygienic to wash towels at 60 even if there’s no difference perceptible to human sight or smell because towel bacteria are somehow more dangerous than the bacteria on our bodies.
What I’m saying is if you need to do an occasional 60C wash to maintain the machine or your towels get smelly quicker washing at 40C then go for it, but it’s not a rule everyone needs to follow.

My little one is tube fed, his tube goes into his gastrostomy in his stomach, it's an opening directly through his skin into his stomach. The site is often colonised with bugs like Staph A, his towels and tubie pads (little pads he wears around the stoma for comfort and to mop up any leaks) come directly into contact with the skin around the stoma in a way his clothes don't. Because of this towels are washed at a higher temperature along with his bed mats as he is doubly incontinent and I haven't met a continence product yet that keeps him dry overnight.

No, I don't leave towels in a damp pile on the bathroom floor between uses.

Your use case is one where I’d absolutely wash the towels at a high temperature. I’m sorry you’re both going through that and hope things get better soon.

Forgot to say I wash towels at 40.

I haven’t used it for ages either. It gums up your machine with gunk - ditto gel pods. After reading a post on here by Piglet John (remember him?) I did the very hot empty wash he advised, and was appalled to see the dirty grey foam that appeared.

It took another very hot empty wash for it to come clean - I’d been using the pods and conditioner for ages.
Now it’s just soda crystals in the drawer and ordinary washing powder in the drum. Washing is fine.

A bonus is no plastic bottles or gel pod containers!

I wash towels separately or with bedding, depends on how much I’ve got. You can’t wash then with tops or bras or jeans - its very different

Yes always, I don’t want billy bits in my other items, and I wash them higher wash

Yes, separate at 60 on a longer wash

Yes, once a week with face cloths, tea towels. Powder, no fabric softener on 60c.

@JacknDiane i just do 3 washes, whites coloureds and darks so everything that is in these colours goes in the wash, i dont follow any silly rules. Nothing is really that dirty. Do whst ever suits you.

Me too

Nope, I throw them in with other washing.

I bung it all in and hope for the best.

Yes but then i shove a few clothes in there also so it’s a full load

i believe 40 degrees is enough for anything.