eco balls (merged)

cinnamint

I use soapnuts. They leave everything lovely and soft. Not that great on er..stains but I use them for my towels. Don't need fabric softener. They're biodegradable of course and don't knacker your machine up as I'm sure powders do. No chemicals or nasties and no animal testing! (big brand companies, you know who you are). I do use Ecover as well for the whites.

SoozyJ22

I bought some of the eco wash balls earlier this year and am not that impressed. They leave little white bits all over my washing, and they're not that great on stains even when I've used the stain stick. This has all been on the 'quick wash' setting on my machine which works fine with my old non-bio powder.

jacky_horn

Hi

I hope I am doing this right. I am interested in finding out if anyone else who uses eco balls to wash their clothes has noticed a musty smell on their garments. My daughter has noticed this too. I have been using them for about 3 months now.

Volcano

These have been covered in depth, please do a search, but briefly:

If they are refillable balls (i.e. they use some kind of mild detergent like soap nuts that needs refilling occasionally) then though they clean your clothes, they won't add fragrance. Some people use a few drops of essential oils to 'freshen up' the washing.

If they are the solid i.e. non-refillable ones, then they will do nothing to clean your clothes as well as not fragrance them.

The musty smell is quite normal and seems to be due to certain types of dirt (maybe oils etc) not being cleaned from the clothes sufficiently and building up over time.

jacky_horn

Thanks Volcano and sorry if it has been covered. I put in "eco balls" at the top of the page and nothing came up. I'm new to this. Is there any way of getting rid of the smell?

Volcano

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=77987&highlight=eco+balls

To be honest, the ones that are plain plastic are a scam and the manufacturers lie about how they are supposed to work. Washing without the balls (so in plain water) is the same thing.

Many people use washing powder but only a fraction of what is recommended; dissolves oils and greases, makes your clothes smell nice and less impact on the environment than when you used loads of powder.

Robin_T_Cox

Has anyone tried these? Did you save any money?

http://www.ecoballsdirect.co.uk/

sarah_2-2

It's really easy to search the forums- just click 'search' in the toolbar at the top and type ecoballs and you'll get heaps of posts! Alternatively you could have just cast your eye about 5 posts down the page... try spending at least 1 minute searching first. Ecoballs

Robin_T_Cox

It obviously depends on where you search. In this case, entering 'eco ball' in the Search box at the top of this page produced zilch, whereas (at your suggestion) using the Search link in the thread menu actually produced 12 relevant threads.

Thanks for your help, and I trust that the new forum layout will adress this.

moonrakerz

Obviously a modern version of pounding your clothes on the rocks at the side of the river.

Very well named !