After some careful thought, we decided to remove the washing machine from our mobile condo design. When this all started, we thought it would be cool to say, “See? We can have everything you have in your big house. We’re not making any sacrifices and actually have more conveniences by living this way.” Since living in a vehicle—or even living in a small space—is such a tiny part of our true goals, being able to say that is becoming less significant as we move forward. (Although, I still think it's true.) So, while it would be possible and probably even easy to have a modern washing machine, I don’t particularly want one anymore and "because I can" just to prove a point isn’t really a good enough reason to go through all that trouble. This isn’t as much about power, water, cost, or space as it is about preference and performance.
We will have the option between two hand washing methods (I like both) and a spin dryer. The first one is a hand crank Wonder Wash. The only complaint I have with this product is that the base isn’t very sturdy. Instead of writing it off completely, we intend to construct a more suitable base out of wood or metal in the future but for now it’ll be fine.
The second one is the Mobile Washer. For us, we've found that it's great with a five gallon bucket but it can be used with larger containers as well. Instead of going through all the details, I'll just direct you to a more in-depth review.
Then there's the spin dryer. I wouldn't be recommending either of the two washing methods above without something like this. It uses 300 watts and takes only about 2 minutes to spin out almost all the water. I tested to see if it was worth it by spinning a small load of laundry after already going through the spin cycle of my regular washing machine. The clothes were already fairly dry so I didn't think any more water would come out but it ended up extracting several more cups. After that it only takes a few hours to hang dry the clothes. I had a pair of my brother-in-law's socks in there with the rest of our stuff and they were so dry when they came out they were almost immediately wearable. They were some kind of moisture wicking material, so I'm thinking of replacing some of our clothes with others made from material that will be better suited for easy drying.
We still have our GE Spacemaker electric dryer as well but will only be using it in a limited capacity. It'll be nice to having the option of a dryer to fluff up the clothes or for when we're in a hurry, but I'd like to hang dry as often as I can.
Whatever floats your boat, but personally I don't understand that at all. It would take some serious time out of my day to do the washing. I don't get what you mean by performance, I have read that front loading machines do a good job, and you would use less detergent and water. I dig the spin dryer, though, they are the way to go really, and I'm surprised these machines aren't more common. Because the water is removed from the clothes as a liquid, it should leave less detergent on your clothes, too. I suppose the amount of residual detergent on your clothes would be approximately proportional to the concentration of detergent in the water that is still on the clothes, multiplied by the amount of water you evaporate rather than spin out.
ReplyDeleteIf you wanted to get the clothes cleaner still, or detergent and dirt too I think, I guess you could take them out after the wash cycle, and spin dry before rinsing. The rinse cycle is basically a dilution of the water in the clothes, right, so if there is less water oon the clothes, it will be diluted more with the same amount of rinsewater. This is the reason that even if I got a spin dryer, I would still want a washer with a high speed spin cycle, so it can rinse better.
I also like the idea of a no spin washer coupled with a spin dryer which would be really cheap and small, just a drum with a small motor attached, seal it shut and then you use a spin drying between rinse and wash then again for drying. The reason you can't effectively combine the spin cycle and wash cycle in the same machine is that the dimensions of the drum are not right for both. You want a slim long drum for spinning because the g force goes up with the square of the rpm and only proportionally to the diameter, plus with the right drum dimensions you don't need to worry about shock absorbers because it is self stabilizing to some degree.
So except for the need for a bit more manual labor in between the was hand the spin and to hang the clothes to dry, the no spin washer+ spin dryer approach is really better all round, cleans the clothes better, uses less water, takes less total batch time, is smaller and cheaper.
We currently have a front load washer and it works great. It's efficient with detergent and water and takes about 30 minutes to do a load of laundry.
ReplyDeleteI can hand wash 2 half size loads, including rinsing & spinning in about 20 minutes. They seem to be equally clean (if not better due to the spinner, as you said, removing more detergent.) I use about the same amount of water and (homemade) detergent as my front load washer does.
The only significant difference is the amount of physical labor involved. Obviously, out the 30 minutes of normal washing, I'm only involved in a few minutes of loading and unloading, while I'm busy for the entire time with hand washing.
Honestly, I'd rather plunge a bucket of clothes than work out with hand weights. When we settle down, we'll likely build a bicycle powered washer. It's fun stuff.
Also, I'm not sure how you determined that it would be smaller and cheaper for your suggested method of using an electric washing machine and a spin dryer. Our washing machine cost ≈$1,200 and a significant cost would be added for the electrical & plumbing supplies to install it. The Wonder Wash, Mobile Washer & 5 gallon bucket with lid had a combined total of only ≈$70 and require no electricity to operate or additional plumbing.
I'm not trying to change your mind or anything, but just to try to clarify what I was trying to say, I mean a no spin washing machine would be a lot cheaper to make than a spin capable one. It's pretty expensive to make 25 kg of clothes and water spin at 1000 rpm, it takes counterweights, a powerful motor, shock absorbers, safety interlocks and probably a bunch of other stuff I don't know about, which all costs some serious $. I know you said money isn't the issue, but on a more practical note (since as far as I can tell there are no no spin machines available on the market, and for anyone else maybe reading this), I bet there are a lot of a "broken" washing machines that wash fine but can't spin. One of those could have a second life when coupled with a spin drying machine, or better maybe you could find a "broken" washer-dryer combo unit so the dryer is there for dewrinkling. Especially a ventless one because that would be more energy efficient too from the way they work by recycling the air rather than just heating and blowing it away. I suppose you could rig a normal dryer to recycle the air but you would have to bodge something to reduce the power output of the heating element or I bet the whole thing would immediately overheat and (hopefully, if it did) shut down.
ReplyDeleteI think this would be a great option to the spin dryer and this is what I plan on having when we begin our life full time on the road. It's the old school hand crank clothes wringer. I remember as a kid helping my Mom wring out the clothes before we line dried them. One consideration isn't just how you will launder your clothing, but what clothing you take. When you're primarily hand washing and line drying you'll want to be sure the get light weight, fast drying fabrics that require no ironing. You're definitely not going to want a lot of jeans and sweatshirts. :)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.rubylane.com/item/380235-768095/Salesman-Sample-Hand-Crank-Clothing