Detergent use in hard water area

I know this topic may have been discussed elsewhere. Us engineers tend to lean favourably toward power based detergent because of its cleaning power and built in water softener.

I uncovered two cases recently that may persuade you to think differently on how we give advice to customers on detergent in hard water area. I have evidence based theory, I attended two appliances, both over ten years old – Hotpoint WMA obviously, in a very hard water area. Both machines are in excellent condition, not a speck of mould, dust, rust even the bodywork has that just out of a package new look. Both has heater failures through hard work but not a speck of limescale can be found on the element. Both heaters were clean as a whistle, good as new except it’s open circuit. I asked the customer on both jobs on what detergent they were using and how long have they been using this detergent.

The answer may come as a surprise, Ariel liquid gel. I think I shall be recommending it to my hard water customers from now on as I have seen the effects and the state of the machine. I guess this liquid gel does actually protects the machine and have almost good cleaning power as powder. I do not know how other liquid detergent compares and I found that those two job were strangely similar and if not remarkable to see the condition of it.