How to Remove Odors Form Laundry?

Try vinegar. If that doesn't work, try baking soda. Another thing I've found that is inexpensive and seems to work on pet and kid odors is OdoBan. You can get it a Sam's Club for about $10/gallon and it goes a long way.

I had this problem with my towels. I did some reading and found that adding 1/4 cup of bleach to the water with soap before adding the towels removed the smell without removing the color. It is great.

Powder oxyclean along with regular laundry detergent, takes out any kind of odor and doesn't leave any cover up odor.
SarahMM

Have you tried Odo-ban? I use it on pretty much everything. Its a disinfectant also. Works great on mildew odors. You can get it at Sam's club.

Vinegar Vinegar Vinegar. Plain ol white vinegar. It is THE best at removing yucky smells. I learned about this when I worked at a brain injury house that older men lived in. They had problems w/ incontinence and really bad body oder. The vinegar would take out any smell.

I add vinegar to all my wash. I put it in when I put in the soap. I add about 1 cup to every load. The laundry smells a bit like vinegar when it comes out but once it is dry no more smells of any kind. It is AWESOME!!

J.;
I use Oxyclean and a good laundry soap, for my husbands work clothes, baking soda is also helpful.
I sure hope this helps.
J.

You've had some good suggestions although some individuals with allergies could react to pinesol. Make sure you aren't over loading the washer. If it's a top loader clothes should be placed in loosely, to 2/3 full, for a front laoder, again clothes in loosely 3/4 full. Try washing soda or Borax. Here in Colo we tend to have fairly hard water (my well water is just about liquid rock at 38 points) so you may find that a liquid detergent works better. Try using the presoak cycle or a double rinse.

Another consideration is to go to the source. Are these teens eating plenty of fresh greens and fruits? Greens act as a natural deodorizer. Taking Chlorophyll either capsules or liquid can do wonders for body odor. Takes a week or so to get your system balanced and you will notice a big difference - it also helps keep you regular!

I use Hydrogen peroxide. Just put about a 1/2 a cup in laundry I sometimes let it soak in the washing machine, but it takes the smell out! It is great and cheap!

You should try white vinegar as your fabric softener, and do not use dryersheets or other softeners...these seem to trap in the smells. I am a cloth diaper user/home washer, and this had taken care of most smells for me. On occasion I have had to strip synthetic fabrics with Dawn to fully remove some odors (don't do this in your machine...it will over flow). You can also try adding Oxyclean to their wash to sanatize.

If none of these suggestion work I would suggest trying a residue free detergent. I love Charlie's Soap.
Good Luck,

J.

Try OxyClean in with the laundry detergent when you do the wash - it's the miracle cure for just about everything!

Oxy Clean should help. My husband used to bring his uniform home every now and then, and Tide worked well to get the smell out, but it also faded the uniform. You could always tell which ones had been washed at home. GE had them professionally washed, and they always came home looking and smelling great. You might check with some factories or dry cleaners and see what they use.

I would also suggest the vinegar or rubbing alcohol. Just a capfull or two will work wonders!

Baking Soda works great for smells even in laundry. My husband has very smelly feet. I use baking soda in my laundry and his socks always come out smelling fresh.

Have you tried the Arm N Hammer laundry soap, it works really well, I had a cat pee on our dirty clothes and it got the smell out, One other thing you can do is put a little simple green in the laundry, I have a smelly teen also so I know how frustrating it can be to have smelly clean clothes.

Bleach is about all that works. Try Clorox color-afe as it is not really bleach. But bleach is really going to do it if that doesn't work. I have run my wash with a couple white towels and bleach to clean out the machine as I have a front loader and the water sits in there sometimes making it smell. Also, do laundry only when you can watch it. Don't let things sit in there wet.

I've always liked regular scented Gain for getting smells out, and then a lightly scented fabric softener. OxyClean never seems to do much for me, but vinegar helps, too, and it also helps to keep colors from bleeding. Don't worry -- te clothes won't smell like vinegar when they're done. Good luck!

Hi J.,

I distribute Shaklee products which are non-toxic, etc.
(http://www.shaklee.net/sowing4health/getclean)
One of my customers that uses the laundry concentrate, says it washes the diesel smell right out of her husband's clothes every time. (He works on diesel trucks all day.)

I have concerns about Oxiclean and suggest you look at the government's website with the household database. Here's the link to it:
http://householdproducts.nlm.nih.gov/cgi-bin/household/br...

I've copied the part about Acute health effects from the above link below:
Acute Health Effects: From MSDS:
Effects of Overexposure-
Inhalation: Dust inhalation may cause irritation of respiratory tract; may cause
dizziness, drowsiness, headache, nausea and vomiting.
Effects of Overexposure-Ingestion: Harmful if swallowed
Effects of Overexposure-Eyes: Extremely irritating to the eyes and may cause severe damage
Effects of Overexposure-Skin: Slightly irritating to the skin; solvent action can dry the skin.

God bless,
L.

Vinegar! Is awesome! I soak my daughter's panties in 2 gal of water with a cup of vinegar when she has accidents and it takes the smell right out. Google vinegar solutions, I know it has a solution for sweat and sweat stains.

Hi J.,

My husband's socks are horrifying in the odor department! Ha! I used to use bleach but decided to go a bit more natural. I've just been using baking soda in my socks load. I was quite surprised how well it worked to get the odor out! I use probably about 1/4 cup per load. Hope this helps!

My husbands work out clothes can stink a whole load of laundry and so I started adding a touch of Lysol Concentrated Disinfectant (a brown skinny bottle with yellow lid) and Downy Fabric Softner to the "fabric softener" dispenser in my washer. I put in these detergents and then fill the rest of the dispenser with water. My clothes come out smelling great.

Have you tried Laundry Soda? I read about washing towels that continued to have a sour smell after washing with laundry soda. Wash the load as usual with detergent and 1/2 cup laundry soda (Super Washing Soda). Also add 1/2 cup baking soda to the rince cycle. It workad for my stinky towels, so it might be worth a try. Good luck.

Hi J.,
I have worked in Group homes and with individuals that mess their pants and we always added some vinegar to the washing and that seemed to help with the odors. You might want to try that. Or another thing that might work is get detergent that has fabreze in it. We found that vinegar worked best though.

Good luck
let us know what you find that works

I use Oxyclean and 10-15 drops of tea tree oil for smelly laundry. Tea tree oil is a natural disinfectant, and would do the same as Pine Sol, I think. You can also try lavender oil, another natural disinfectant.

I used this combo on our cloth diaper laundry and it worked great.

If you have hard water, you might also consider a water softener - the minerals in hard water can exacerbate the odor problem.

I seem to have good luck with getting mildew smell out of clothes with vinegar. Maybe that would work . About a half cup or so. Good luck.

don't spend a lot of money. there is borax on the laundry aisle for about $4 a box add a scoup to your wash. put a cup of distilled white vinegar in place of liquid laundry softner. when you take the wash out of the washer it will smell like vinegar but once it comes out of the dryer not only will it not stink it will smell fresh and clean--no stink and no vinegar anymore. I use this with my laundry and for the two year old messes and leaks that come along. it also works great when I forget a load (yeah, I admit I do that sometimes) it takes the smell out of my wash and I can forgive myself and move on.

OXICLEAN is my favorite thing for laundry. My girls are only two and tree but we have night time diaper leaks still. I put the load in with a full scoop of Oxiclean and let is soak for about thirty minutes. This is more water efficient that washing the load two or three times. Good luck.

Ok, now this is going to sound strange but it really works. My daughter has chronic constipation and one side effect is that she still soils her underware and the smell is terrible. I was lamenting to my sister one day and she suggested using a few tablespoons of pinesol in my wash. She also suggested a little vinegar as a bacteria killer which contributes to the smell. I now add vinegar and pinesol to every load of laundry and the smells are gone, even the mildew smell that permiated my towels when I lived in the south. I use the lemon pinesol and it smells great, the whole house smells great when I do the laundry. I hope this helps you!

I use about 1/2 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda with every load (comes in a yellow box near the Clorox 2 type stuff). Not only does it help with odor control, it's also a detergent booster so it helps your laundry detergent do what it's supposed to (but doesn't always) do and can be used all around the house for other cleaning. I have also used Borax (in a green box - same location in the store) which worked equally well, but seems to be just a little bit more expensive.

Good luck, teenagers can be a bit stinky. :)