To those of you who have been using these "home made" detergents, are you experiencing any odor, mold or mildew issues? The reason I ask is because castile soap builds up into a gooopy, gel-like gunk if not properly rinsed. This could potentially cause problems in washers. Every home-made product I've tried - from detergent to fabric softener - has proven unsatisfactory. Either the products don't clean well, they risk building up in my machine or on my clothes or they just don't work. Price is not the only consideration, which is what appears to be driving this homemade laundry movement.

When mc was having the sudsing problems with the Whirlpool Duet I had suspected it may have been the detergent. I went out and purchased some Tide HE liquid. Upon using it I had the same trouble as mc with oversudsing and the suds not rinsing out. Out of curiosity, I sent Tide an email explaining my problem in detail. I explained that I had purchased Tide HE liquid for my Frigidaire Affinity. Specifically told them the type of machine too. I informed them about the excessive suds, the poor rinsibility, the stiffness and the fact I can not use fabric softener due to having small children and the effects it would have on the flame retardent on their clothes. I explained that due to the liquid formulas concentration, I was unable to cut the amount of liquid used back to a safe level. I even informed them that I had seen others mention similiar problems on the net. I was very nice in my email and this was the response I got. Mon, 9 Jun 2008 09:29:26 -0400 (EDT) "P&G Consumer Relations" cleanclothes@custhelp.com Thanks for contacting P&G. [Incident: 080608-001294] I'm sorry you experienced oversudsing while using our detergent. There are a few situations that can cause this. They include: -- Using too much detergent for the amount of soil in each load. -- Water hardness level. Less detergent can be used in soft water. -- Do you use cold water for most wash loads? You might be experiencing buildup of detergent and mineral deposits in the outside tub of your washer. This can happen when cold water is consistently used for washing. Here's how you can fix that: add 1/2 gallon of white vinegar to a full tub of hot water. Run the washer through a complete cycle without clothing. If this resolves the problem you may want to repeat the process every 6 months. -- Overloading the washer can be a cause. Suds can become trapped in clothing if there's not enough room for them to circulate freely. -- Using regular detergent in a high efficiency washer. If you have one of the new HE washers, make sure you're using HE detergent, like Tide HE. A final word, it isn't unusual to see suds in the sink when the rinse water drains. The force of the water coming from your washer can generate suds as the tub empties. Since I'm not able to help the way I'd like via email, I'm following up via postal mail. You should hear from me in 7-10 days. Thanks for taking the time to write. Debi Tide Team [---001:001084:47166---] As you can see per the response they did not read my email to them in it's entirety as I had told them I was using the Tide HE liquid. They also totally neglected the fact that the suds were not rinsing out completely aka still seeing suds in the washer, not the rinse water. I also as of yet have not gotten this secondary contact she refered to. To be honest, I really didn't care one way or the other. I just wanted to see what they would say.

I did the true test today.....my 13 year old son's sheets. I swear I can smell his room from down the hallway. He's cute, he's a good dresser and he wears deoderant but he's just ripe and his sheets....funky. I felt this was a 2 scoop load and I have to say the overall finished product was better than my 1 scoop sheet load yesterday. They were de-funked. So, my question is....should I be using 2T for large loads? This would bring the # of loads down to 40 if you are doing large loads. I'm fine with that as it never once crossed my mind how many loads I get out of a box of Tide. I also throw in a scoop of Oxy Clean too with sheets, whites, towels.

@ ladeeanne I'm laughing at your jingle at the end, but NOT laughing about what CS did to your clothes. Most people love the product or hate it. Initially I had good results and said good things about the product, but over time I noticed my whites greying and starting to feel stiff. I emailed Charlie's and they suggested I use 2 TBS instead of 1 TBS per load. That didn't do anything. I have soft, conditioned water. I stopped using CS and went back to my trusted Persil. I've added Vaska and Clorox Green Works to the mix as well. Vaska, although a liquid only, is everything CS should have been. I'm sure CS works for some folks - there are many satisfied users. But because the product does not contain the usual ingredients you find in more mainstream products - soil suspension and color protection agents, water softeners and chelators, etc. - results will vary wildly depending on water conditions. People often criticize the mass merchandise products (Tide, Cheer, etc.) for having too many and possibly toxic ingredients. However, those products also perform rather uniformly across a wide variety of water conditions. Once you take away those ingredients, you must make sure that what you're using is suitable for your water conditions. This is the reason that Charlie's Soap now sells a product to use with CS in hard water conditions. A primary ingredient in CS is sodium carbonate. If you have hard water, that sodium carbonate will cause the calcium in the water to form a precipitate which will then settle back onto your clothes and washer parts. That may be what you're seeing in your dark clothes. Try soaking them overnight in vinegar to see if that can loosen or dissolve the calcium. You can also use citric acid, which can be purchased in your grocery store's dishwasher aisle as Lemi Shine. Throw a couple of tablespoons into your front loader and run a cycle with your ruined fabrics.