inventive ways to dry washing

[BooyhooRemembering]

i have a lot of washing to dry at the minute and have no tumble drier so i have had to be a bit imaginative with drying methods. i know everyone has different methods so i thought it would be a good idea to collect all the different ideas into one thread to make it easy for someone to find them all.

here's my list of suggestions (i know these wont be practical/possible for everyone)

-obvious one is the washing line but of course is weather dependant
-if you have space ouside you could build a shelter- my mum is lucky enough to have a barn that is no longer used and she has two big lines in there.
-indoor laundry pulley(if possible have it fitted over a heat source)
-radiators and radiator airers
-clothes horse
-hotpress slats
-dehumidifier in a small room/cupboard with clothes on airer
-hang clothes on hangers on curtain rails/doorways
-banister rail
-tumble drier (probably the most expensive method)
-heated drying rack

that's all i can think of right now. please add your own and maybe i can get a bit more washing done in less time

I've got a pulley near a radiator and the back door. Full load dry in less than 24 hrs if the heating is on for a couple of hours morning and evening. Clothes horse below it if I've had to do more than one load.

Don't try to dry plimsolls in the microwave. Just don't.

We use the conservatory, and have it closed off to the rest of the house.

I use a clothes horse and a dehumidifier. We have no outside space but we do have an area for drying clothes and it is well ventilated

If its not actually raining, putting the washing out for an hour or so, in the cold, takes quite a bit of the water out - I nearly always pull a face at DH when he suggests hanging out the washing at 5pm, and bringing it in an hour later, but honestly, a bit of wind makes a massive difference to how quickly it dries - tho its pretty cold when it comes in, and so doesn't feel any drier.

My tenants dried clothes in the bathroom with the extractor on, resulting is black marks on the walls and the whole flat smelling damp. Despite having a garden and rotary clothes line. Had to get the whole place redecorated when they moved out.

sounds like the extractor fan was ineffective or the door open . If the fan is on and the door and window closed, the airflow will be from the house into the bathroom through the gap under the door, and this airflow prevents the water vapour drifting around the house. That's why an extractor is better than a window.

Many people refuse to turn on extractor fans if they are noisy or the person does not realise that a bathroom fan will typically run for 50 hours on 14p worth of electricity.

i'm definitely going to ask for one to be fitted in my house. i didn't realise they were so cheap to run.

willaby have you ever had a problem with mould before these tenants? i'm asking because i've lived in 3 different houses, i've dried inside in all of them (bedrooms too) and only one of them developed mould and that's with the windows open all day long (i alwyas have windows open). TBH i think some houses are just better at clearing the moisture out than others, it must be the layout or size of windows or something but the house i lived in that developed mould already had marks on the wall when i moved in where it looked like mould had been cleaned previously.

We've lived in the same privately rented house for 5 years. No central heating, no extractor fan in the bathroom and no tumble.

Dry everything outside when i can and if not, i can hang bits on the shelf over the storage heater upstairs.

For big loads, towels and duvets, jeans and stuff, DH takes all to laundrette

Willaby, how do you expect them to dry washing when it's raining?

I have 3 clothes horse in the kitchen. It's pretty cold in the winter, one medium radiator for double room and plenty drafts behind the sink, but not much else.

Whats a hot press? Is that an airing cupboard?

How damp can washing be when you put it folded into an airing cupboard?

They also dried clothes in one of the bedrooms. The bedrooms are North facing and the windows are old stained glass ones. I didn't have any problems the 2 years I lived there.

Did you have a tumble drier?

It just seemed ridiculous they never used the drier outside. It was behind the chef with weeds growing over it. I took it home and now have 2 in my garden.

They could have put the clothes horses they used in the bedroom on the patio when it was dry.

They also didn't open the windows for 5 years, my DH had to jemmie them open ( they were able to open when they moved in).

Roll on exchanging contracts and it not belonging to me anymore.

The window opening is probably more significant. The 1930s house I lived in I did my damnedest to keep it aired and it was still rotten, due to lack of both ventilation vents or insulation.

Once or twice a year I take it all to the launderette to catch up. Usially this doesn't need doping til after Christmas but the washing is really getting me down right now, so may be tomorrow.

The best tip is tp train your kids to wear stuff more than once. I'm still working on that one.

I can spell, just can't type.

a hot press is an airing cupboard. but you dont fold the clothes in it to dry, you hang them over the slats/rungs like you would on a clothes horse.

Booy, is it quite large? I'd only be able to hang three things in mine.

my current one is great but in my last house the airing cupboard was tiny and i hated hanging stiff in there because it was so awkward and cramped.

how many 'shelves' do you have in yours? when you say 3 things do you mean you have 3 shelves and would be laying teh clothes across the shelves? what i do is feed the clothes through the gaps in the slats so one item hung over each slat. it's usually only teh dc's clothes as they are shorted. i cant hang my trousers or long tops as the space between the sets of shelves is too short.

you could also get a couple of those plastic underwear peg things from the likes of poundstretcher and hang small items on it. you would hook teh peg thing onto a slat.

interesting link. I tend to stick mine outside where possible like today as we all do on this thread I should think. I have a small utility room where the boiler is and have a wall airer and a clothes horse.

I must admit to use the dryer on some of it. I don't want too much damp washing around the place. don't know how much electricity it uses, is quite old but still goes.

an ordinary tumble-drier uses about 60p of electricity to dry a full load of cotton, and correspondingly less for smaller loads or lighter synthetics

I've just found on top of the kitchen cupboard, a Marina Dryer with 4 lines. It's still in the box, and was from Tesco priced at £2.99. With the old style price label still on. May use it in my kitchen but now wondering if it would be worth selling!?

trouble is we all know really that drying inside releases water into the house adn therefor can cause damp etc but we live in the uk. it rains.

i give up hanging out at this time of year as my yard is sheltered so little wind factor and it is pretty pointless.

I have a pulley airer. I open windows daily to air the house and the way my house is all damp seems to get funnelled down to the bathroom so I have an extracor in there that has a humidistat so turns itself on and off as needed. It is in a downstairs kitchen/bathroom extension so you cook, it turns on. you hang the nappies to dry, it turns in :)