Drying clothes?

SecondStar

Household generates about 4 loads of washing a week, too expensive to run the temperamental tumble drier. Don’t have an outdoor space for washing line or whirly-gig, or the headroom for a ceiling drying rack. Trying to keep the heating off, bar the occasional 30 minute run to take the edge off, for as long as possible.

Have an indoor clothes horse, but with the heating off things aren’t drying on it as fast as new loads need to be washed and dried. It’s permanently up at the moment, and taking up an awful lot of space.

Am I missing a trick? Is there a way to dry clothes fully, quickly, and cheaply, or is it that you have to pick 2/3?

Mr.Generous

A dehumidifier is my method, they dry the air and create a draught, also the heat generated is released back into the house, plus dry air = less damp and mold, and is cheaper to heat that a high humidity home.

Still resisting putting the heating on 30-10-22

Gers

There's a long discussion here - I have a dehumidifier in the spare room which is very effective. Mind you I don't have four loads of family washing to contend with though it'll certainly be cheaper than running an electric fire.

joedenise

Can you afford to buy a heated clothes horse with cover (check Lakel*nd website)?  Supposed to be cheap to run - something like 6p an hour.

Katiehound

Do you have any outside space to fix a canopy?
One of my neighbours in Ireland has one on the protected wall (away from prevailing westerly wet winds) and the washing blows out there all year, maybe not completely dry but not far off.

I have a Leifheit drying rack on the wall over the bath and the clothes do dry in time. (But I don't have multiple loads.)
Is there any way of cutting down on the quantity of washing such as wear the clothes (not underwear) an extra day? 

-taff

If you can't think of a way, what about suing the laundrette tumble driers? They'll usually take a few loads at once. I used to wash my stuff in the flat, then take it there to tumble.

Kerreh

I live in a small flat and have an over the door clothes airer (think it's brabantia) so whilst things still take a while to dry I can shimmy past the door and it's not using up floor space... 

PipneyJane

My friend has a ceiling mounted drying rack in the dead space above her stairs.  Would that be a possibility for you? 

(She also has two in her downstairs hall, because the ceiling there is much higher than in any of her rooms.)

- Pip

Mistral001

For your health's sake get a dehumidifier.  I do not heat my house much in the winter either.  The £2500 a year heating bill for an average family seems like something someone living in a mansion would use as far as I am concerned  Last year my heating costs were less than 10% of that figure.

I dry my clothes outdoors, but still find that I need a dehumidifier in the winter time.   Cold houses get damp from humans and pets breathing out and from humid air from the outside.  To add the moisture from drying clothes inside is surely going to make for a very damp house.  

Most centrally heated houses with the heating turned on throughout the winter will have a humidity level of around 40 to 50%, but my house with only one room heated for part of the day in winter would regularily have a humidity of 80 to 90% before I got a dehumidifier.  It should not get above 70% for the house to stay healthy.  I run the dehumidifier for about five or six hours a day.  Over that period, the dehumidifier collects about just shy of a litre of water.  

-taff

I live in three bed semi. That's my projected bill or a bit less for the year. It's not a mansion, it's reality now. Last year my bill was under half that.

Our central heating doesn't even work that well, it's on for 3/4 hour every other week in the morning so far and an hour on the odd day when I'm really cold. I've lit the fire today for the first time because its so cold and we'll be relying on that to heat the house for the most part over winter.

-taff

I've actually just put a load of washing on to take advantage f that to dry being as it's howling a gale out there with sideways rain