ecoballs

Reading article "ecoballs" - Reply to this / 9 comment(s)
An eco-friendly washing machine replacement for detergent. Sounds intriguing..

http://www.ecoballsdirect.co.uk/ 

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1. Re: ecoballs by ecosrights, 642 days ago

   My husband bought me some of these for Christmas (yes, I know it's not exactly a conventional present, but I wouldn't have bought them otherwise and I was striving for a green Christmas).
   
   So far, I have to say that they appear to work. They are weird things though - I thought that they would be really small, but you have to put three other them in the machine and each are about the size of a tennis ball with a foam protective rim - they look like space ships!
   
   We've had to use a bit of Ecover's stain remover on a couple of my son's nursery tops, but they rarely get very clean anyway.
   
   if you do the sums - about £35 for 1000 30 minute washes, then they aren't badly priced at all. It'll be interesting to see how long they do last - 1000 washes would last us about 5 years now that we aren't washing nappies any more! It makes it very cheap when you think of the price like that.

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   1. Re: Re: ecoballs by duncan, 639 days ago

      Here's what they look like:
      
      
      
      and, from the top....
      
      

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      1. Re: Re: Re: ecoballs by Anonymous, 378 days ago

         I have been using the EcoBalls for a month and have failed to get my laundry even half as clean as when using my mild detergent. Whites I had to wash twice at a higher temperature and as for short programmes I found the EcoBalls useless as the garments came out with no change other than being wet and in need of a wash.
         
         The only success was the softness of the clothes but I suspect that this was down to having large objects bashing around the machine (EcoBalls are very large compared to other ‘wash balls’ and they recommend you use all three at once). I feel sure large pebbles would give a similar softness but for the sake of my machine will give the experiment a miss!
         
         Surely adding detergent and/or bleach along with the EcoBalls as the manufacturer suggests is not only pointless economically but environmentally as well? I for one will save my money and stick to the detergent with minimal packaging that works at a low temperature and on a short programme.
         

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         1. Re: Re: Re: Re: ecoballs by ecosrights, 377 days ago

            shame to hear that. They have worked fine for us. Yes, there are times where I end up applying Ecover stain remover to bad grass and paint stains on our son's clothes, but other than that they work really well. I'd expect to have problems getting those things clean anyway....

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2. Re: ecoballs by JoP, 621 days ago

   I tried a similar product from Lakeland a few years ago - it didn't work too well, but will give this a go, thanks for the tip!

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3. Re: ecoballs by duncan, 615 days ago

   There's a review of eco balls and the dryer balls here:
   
   http://bean-sprouts.blogspot.com/2007/01/whole-...
   
   We've been using the ecoballs for a while now and whilst they don't get things sparkling clean, they are much kinder on our skin. My son suffers from eczma a little bit but his skin seems to be grateful for the change recently.

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4. Re: ecoballs by ecosrights, 216 days ago

   A handy thing to remember when you're using Ecoballs - don't over fill the machine. Apparently it's worth remembering all of the time, but since we had a problem with our machine recently and the engineer said to use smaller loads (probably about 50% more loads than we used to unfortunately, but apparently the machine is cheaper to run like this as it takes less energy to heat the water, less water and less energy to spin, so it's no worse than the smaller amount of full loads) I've found that the "space ships" work much better...

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   1. Re: Re: ecoballs by Anonymous, 82 days ago

      Ecoballs work great! I drop in all three balls, add a good dose of bleach or detergent depending on whether I am doing whites or colored clothes and voila! Clean clothes that smell nice!
      
      By themselves, the ecoballs appear to be little more than a placebo.

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      1. Re: Re: Re: ecoballs by ecosrights, 82 days ago

         That sounds as if you're defeating the object of having the ecoballs if you're adding detergent. Shame that you're not having any luck with using them properly.

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