Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

[WhirlpoolQueen]

Well I rather like my little Bosch Compact machine, but as of late been a bit disappointed with the standard of cleaning, especially the cutlery. Rinse Aid level fine, Salt Fine.

I am not a fan of Tablets if am honest and prefer a traditional powder usually Sun, but am finding it impossible to buy now and so as of late I am using Finish. I have today changed to Finish Liquid Gel and the results are a huge improvement, simply perfect. Looking at the two containers, notice that the gel contains Chlorine whereas the powder doesn’t. Would this explain the difference in cleanliness? & why no Chlorine in the powder version of Finish?

Curious
WQ

[kwatt]

Re: Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

Hi WQ,

I tried that Finish stuff in the Dishdrawer and I didn’t rate it. Mind you, I didn’t rate the Dishdrawer that highly either. 😕

Simply, bags of powder as is Fairy, both should be just fine and work fine in the compact but tablets in a compact is asking for trouble.

Chlorine I expect is because they can’t put bleach in a liquid as it sinks to the bottom, it’s a heavy liquid jut as is the case with washing machine liquid detergents. What you might find is a reduction in tannin removal over time from cups as well as poorer performance on heavily coloured food residues, like strongly coloured curries, boglonese sauce and the likes due to the lack of bleach. From memory it doesn’t have the same sanitisation effects either.

HTH

K.

[Trilobite]

Re: Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

Chlorine bleach is much more effective than the oxygen bleaches used in modern powders and tablets. Even Bosch alludes to this in their dishwasher manuals.

Chlorine bleach will sanitise better than oxygen bleaches (it kills all known germs).

Chlorine bleach will remove tea stains from cups much more effectively than oxygen bleaches. Stainless steel looks much brighter, too.

Chlorine bleach can be used in liquid form (eg. in FINISH ‘Liqui-gel’), and used in powdered form (usually listed as sodium dichloroisocyanurate, in the ingredients).

Chlorine bleaches are detrimental to the environment, causing pollution under certain circumstances.

Chlorine bleach (according to a ‘Finish’ representitive I spoke to years ago) can be aggressive to some metals.

[kwatt]

Re: Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

Does much of that not depend on the concentration level though as it will with most chemicals?

To keep it within the set parameters I was led to believe that it could not be made as effective as oxygenated bleach or bleaching agents could be. And, as you say, it certainly doesn’t break down very well in the eco-system. It’s all well and good killing all known germs, so long as it doesn’t kill stuff you don’t want it to.

Asides from which the spectre of chlorine gas lingers, I doubt that it’d make for a strong selling point.

K.

[WhirlpoolQueen]

Re: Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

Thanks for your replies & my apologies for the delay in replying. My dog (Tara) 🙁 has been rather poorly over the weekend with a seizure and so I have been back and forth to vets! The joys of old age I am afraid, she is 15yrs old and looks as if she has Epilepsy. I know better tommorow when the blood results come back.

Getting back to DWD, I find the Fairy Active Bursts overfoam, granted they do clean very well, but in view of heater problems with this type of machine, I don’t wish to tempt provenance.

For some reason the liquid gel detergent seems to clean much much better than the traditional powder. – WQ

[Trilobite]

Re: Chlorine Based Dishwasher Detergent

The chlorine bleach-based dishwasher detergents do not foam up very much (if at all). Whereas the oxygen bleach-based detergents do foam up – in some cases quite badly. This can be very noticable in small capacity machines.

From my experience of using dishwashers over the past twenty years, trying to reduce the foaming by using less of the oxygen-based detergents, is false economy, as the crockery can build up a layer of unremoved staining.

The oxygen bleach-based detergents also employ enzymes, typically Amylase and Protease. They can be more effective at removing baked-on residues. Amylase breaks down starchy stains, such as mashed potato; and Protease breaks down the protein stains, such as meat and gravy residues.

Enzymes and chlorine bleaches apparently don’t work well together; the chlorine deactivates the enzymes.

There seems to be an environmental movement towards removing the chlorine from domestic dishwasher detergents.

Commercial detergents are still available with the chlorine formulation, but you have to look in Farming Supplies shops, and Cash & Carry warehouses.

SUN, FINISH and BRYTA (‘Professional’ powders and liquids ONLY) are the products to examine for chlorine based bleach. The ‘Professional’ tablets are based upon the oxygen bleach and enzyme formulation.

[Author]

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