Laundry Detergent Questions

[Starlight9803]

Here's the situation. I have slightly hard water, a DH that works on cars alot (lots of greasy clothes), and 2 kids that like nothing more than to roll around in our red clay mud LOL. I have been washing laundry in warm water with powder FAB (the cheapest brand that actually gets out our stains), but I would like to wash more in cold water. Problem is that the powder detergent does not dissolve well in our cold water (I'm assuming due to hardness) and the liquid detergents I have tried (Purex, Sun, Xtra, and FAB) can't get out the stains in cold water. By the way, I do let the washer start agitating, then cut off and soak clothing for about 30 minutes, then cut back on to finish the cycle. Here's my two questions:

Have any of you tried a liquid detergent that works well on heavily soiled clothing in cold water? If so, what brand?

If I had to resort to buying pretreaters, water conditioners, etc., to get the liquid to work in cold water, wouldn't I be better off just continuing on with warm water / powder detergent? I only pay $2.98 for the 40 load box of detergent (and only use 1/2 the recommended amount, the liquid version costs almost $4 for similar amount of loads) and though our hot water heater is electric (our entire home is), we do have an insulation blanket on it.

I know this is sort of a nit-picky type question, but wondered what all your thoughts on it were.

[nodmicks]

We have hard water and use XTRA. I just soak the heavily soiled clothes overnight.

[yankeegal]

I have hard water as well-use the Tide detergent for cold water and soak overnight...

[C@rol]

We also have hard water and use Costco's Kirkland
brand of laundry detergent. It works very well.
For hard to remove stains I always pretreat the
clothing or whatever with Advanced Shout .
It works wonders.

[mombottoo]

I don't use powdered laundry soaps, but for really tough stains like garage grease I use Stanley Degreaser and Orange Miracle (also a Stanley product).

[mickee311]

I only cold wash and use Purex liquid. It works great for getting out all kinds of stains. With DH, 4 kids, 3 dogs and 3 puppies, we have lots! Shout is a good stain getter I use too.

[banana]

Soaking overnight is a great idea! Im gonna start doing that

[shoiji]

Is there any way you can disolve the detergent in hot water, then add to the cold water wash?

[Starlight9803]

Is there any way you can disolve the detergent in hot water, then add to the cold water wash?

Thanks everyone for the replies. I guess I will just have to start soaking my laundry for longer periods (which won't be easy since I hang everything outside and like to get it all done in the morning LOL). As for disolving the detergent in hot water first, I tried that, and it didn't seem to help (though it disolves in mearly warm water in the washer who knows what that is about

[leezza]

The water here in our area is very hard.

I use liquid ALL and seem to have good results with it using cold water......although I don't have the stains you have mentioned.

JMHO,
leezza

[hippytreehugger4ever]

I wash my laundry with about 1/3 of the recommended soap and 1 cup of baking soda. You can buy the big boxes in the laundry aisle for under $2.