How do I get the smell of sweat out of clothes!

Rainy-Days

The problem with sweat is that it is caused by the bacteria within the sweat which then breeds and causes the stink.

The only way to deal with sweat is to use a biological detergent (not non bio) and wash at 60 degrees (providing it can be done on the care label) and this should get rid of the smell.

Line dry washing in bright sunshine kills the bacteria as does adding vinegar to the final rinse cycle as well!

Spendless

A hotter wash sorts mine out. I always use bio.

Fruball

I was going to suggest vinegar instead of softener too. It works!

Also, was just reading on another site that you hang all the clothes up in the bathroom above the bath, run a bath with hot water and a cup or two of white vinegar, shut the door and allow the steam to penetrate the clothes. Apparently that works a treat.

Similarly, to get rid of cooking/burned/pet smells, pop half a cup of white vinegar in a saucepan with some water and boil. Smells vanish!

Also, a 5% solution of vinegar in water kills 99% of bacteria!!! I've been using vinegar as a deodoriser, in the WM and for cleaning for ages. Love the stuff!

SpikyHedgehog

I've stopped using fabric conditioner on our clothes as DS1 has eczema that's affected by any conditioners, instead I fill an empty conditioner bottle with one third vinegar and 2 thirds tap water plus a few drops of essential oil.

Since I've been doing it, I've stopped having a problem with stinky shirts after they've been washed.

Now if I can only convince the teenager that deodorant works much better if you actually apply it instead of leaving it on your bedroom shelf, the shirts might not get quite so stinky in the first place!

zippychick

We do have a sweaty clothes thread which should help

Ill merge this in later on

Zip

borderlakland

SpikyHedgehog wrote: »

I've stopped using fabric conditioner on our clothes as DS1 has eczema that's affected by any conditioners, instead I fill an empty conditioner bottle with one third vinegar and 2 thirds tap water plus a few drops of essential oil.

Since I've been doing it, I've stopped having a problem with stinky shirts after they've been washed.

Now if I can only convince the teenager that deodorant works much better if you actually apply it instead of leaving it on your bedroom shelf, the shirts might not get quite so stinky in the first place!

need to persuade ds 2 that should use deoderant BEFORE you get sweaty not as something to try and mask the pong lol.
thanks for the help will try some of the ideas...

20somethinghousewife

Anyone got any tips for getting rid of smells from dry-clean only clothing?

OH has a couple of suit jackets that absolutely STINK and I don't know what to do to about it.

I've tried

• hanging them outside (works a little if there's a good breeze)
• spraying them with oust (worried about ruining the fabric doing this)
• taking to the dry-cleaners (didn't completely remove the smell and they were back to being stinky after the next use, too expensive to do every time)

HELP!

SpikyHedgehog

20somethinghousewife wrote: »

Anyone got any tips for getting rid of smells from dry-clean only clothing?

OH has a couple of suit jackets that absolutely STINK and I don't know what to do to about it.

I've tried

• hanging them outside (works a little if there's a good breeze)
• spraying them with oust (worried about ruining the fabric doing this)
• taking to the dry-cleaners (didn't completely remove the smell and they were back to being stinky after the next use, too expensive to do every time)

HELP!

To be honest, I'd probably wash them on a gentle setting, on the principle that you don't want to use them as they are so if they're ruined, not much is lost...

I machine washed my woollen winter coat this year on a woollen cycle, & put it on a hanger to dry, & its fine.

Outdoorlass

Hi
My OH is a keen cyclist and cummutes to work daily on his bike, he has the lycra cycling gear which is handwash only, I wash this in the machine on the handwash setting, using a fair bit of Bold washing powder, the trouble is it still comes out smelling, obviously he does sweat on his commute as its a fair distance. I am guessing the smell is retaining because the handwash setting is not enough heat to kill the bacteria, I have tried in the past to wash at higher temp which resulted in shrinking the clothing, it is not cheap to replace so will not be doing that again:eek:

Has anyone got any ideas on how to make the clothing less pongy?

Thank you

spuunge

Vinegar, as well as being a good softener is also supposed to be a good deoderant. You could give that a try perhaps? Not sure how lycra would react to it, but you could test it on something equally smelly perhaps?:)