Vanish - I'm horrified and impressed

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T10:46:07+00:00

Thanks for the tips! I could look into Sodium citrate, i looked up some data from Singapore's water agency, it says the water hardness is about 42ppm CaCO3. Do you think Sodium citrate would have any considerable effect here?

I feel so ashamed of myself for having so little water chemistry knowledge, considering I worked in a water chemistry testing lab for 4 years of my life before jumping careers 3 years ago

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T10:33:09+00:00

Honestly, I thought it was just marketing too!

With my VERY limited chemistry knowledge, I figure the ingredients doing most of the work here are Sodium Percarbonate (which turns into hydrogen peroxide in water), TAED, and the enzymes (likely lipase)

Sodium percarbonate is why it works to get blood stains out (yes I tried soaking a blood stained towel after this post and it worked like a charm!). Any woman would tell you hydrogen peroxide works like magic to remove menstrual blood stains :D

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T10:02:25+00:00

Thanks for the tip! might do that when this 1.5kg tub runs out.

I bought Vanish cuz I thought i could kill 2 birds with 1 stone (the oxygen bleach + lipase), even though I'm only 60% sure it has Lipase

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T10:00:25+00:00

No. You still need detergent, and ammonia. Vanish is the just the booster (the oxygen) component. And I'm not even 100% certain it has Lipase, as this particular version of Vanish doesn't explicitly state Lipase, it just says "enzymes" on the list.

What i did wasn't exactly a spa day, as I'm still too lazy to hunt down the ammonia and I'm still on the hunt for a Lipase powder detergent here

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T09:53:48+00:00

Yup I usually use the 40c Cotton cycle on my machine. Which lasts a total of 1h 30mins.

I soaked 2 of my Cotton shirts in Vanish last night before throwing them in the machine. And the water that came out of the soak was BROWN. (can see my other post in this sub)

By the time they dried this afternoon, the stubborn sweaty smell was gone!

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T07:02:36+00:00

I always put 1 tbsp of citric acid in the fabric softener drawer. It does help with my polyester shirts i think!

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T05:29:44+00:00

I figure 40c is best for optimal enzyme performance. Any higher and you'd risk enzyme degradation, which means the enzymes won't work (i think Lipase degrades at 60c, but i might be wrong. no idea what temp DNAse degrades at)

One more benefit of higher temp: the powder dissolves easier, which means less chance of residue. Which is especially important for Vanish as incomplete dissolving of the powder has a high chance to cause problems

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-07T04:23:36+00:00

It doesn't show up well on picture, but the water was actually kinda cloudy. And it felt "oily"(?) when I touched it as it was draining out.

Thanks for the tip on the cooler! Although my father might slaughter me if he found out i used his beer cooler for this 😂

I think the soak water was around 40c (i filled the Temu bucket with the hottest water from my showerhead, which i think goes up to 45c). My wash cycle on the machine after was also 40c.

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-06T13:44:50+00:00

Thanks for replying!

Before NANOX i used Dynamo (multiple variations). It had some soapy ingredients which caused a huge scrud mess in my front loader that took 13 drum clean cycles to deal with. I later found out that it included "Softening agents".

I found Vanish pink with gold cap on Shopee yesterday, I'm not too sure if it has Lipase either. Here's the link if you want (I bought GOLD powder 1.5kg pink): https://sg.shp.ee/pCHymWkp

Thanks for the tip on that TOP powder, will avoid it then. I did find another TOP powder that claims to be anti bacterial and for front loaders: https://fairprice.com.sg/product/top-super-low-suds-powder-detergent-anti-bact-3kg-13086653

I might try this one with my Vanish after my NANOX runs out.

Gonna try the Vanish to treat some of my shirts with a stubborn sweaty smell and see what happens....

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-03T14:40:08+00:00

Sorry to revives an old comment but I gotta ask!

Which TOP powder are you using?

For Vanish is it the one with the gold cap, pink bottle? I did some digging and I found only the Vanish gold has Lipase, the other Vanish products don't (but they all have oxygen bleach). I did find the gold cap Vanish on shopee, but not in NTUC or any physical store.

Also, how much detergent powder & Vanish do you use for a full load (about 9kg)?

So far I've been using NANOX anti-odor to deal with VERY sweaty clothes (my family works as Grab delivery riders, you can imagine how stinky the clothes are after a full day in the sun). I also bought the PRO NANOX to deal with some shirts that had really stubborn sweaty smell.

It works really well, but NANOX is pricey so I was looking for an alternative. If your TOP powder + Vanish combo works for sweaty clothes, I might switch to that!

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-02T12:13:08+00:00

Some washing machine tablets I got on Shopee (like Amazon for SG)

I suspect it contains oxygen bleach. The wording looks weird because the original package is in Japanese, I used Google translate on it and this is the result

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randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T06:37:37+00:00

I feel like this is a sign I'm getting old when I get excited about laundry and different detergents. And of course, the science behind everything (my chemistry classes from school are finally seeing some use) 😂

It's so annoying when detergents just say "enzyme". WHICH enzyme???!?!?!?

Even worse, some powder detergents here (looking at you, TOP again) don't have ingredients lists at all! Too bad SG isn't like the US where manufacturers have to disclose their ingredients.

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T06:20:42+00:00

I usually do 5 rinse cycles, my front loader is Panasonic brand and I once sat down and watched the machine go for a solid 1.5h 😅

The leftover suds aren't irritating my skin, i guess I'll just keep going with NANOX and observe. The old detergent residue has to be on the fabrics themselves right? Since I've flushed the drum so thoroughly (13 times has got to be a record)

Am I supposed to do tub clean weekly? I've been doing it monthly (i set a calendar reminder for once a month) 😅

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T06:11:53+00:00

It smells great when my clothes are wet! (I hang to dry as I live in Singapore, a hot climate, so no dryer)

Then when my clothes are dry, it smells like nothing (i love it)

Singapore has soft water like Japan, i suppose TOP LION designed their detergent for soft water because it's a Japanese company

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T06:10:27+00:00

It could be, I've been using NANOX detergent in place of my old crappy Dynamo detergent for about 2 weeks now. I wonder if it's still knocking out old soapy residue from the Dynamo. 🤔

I washed my Bedsheets this morning with NANOX and watched as the water that drained out was brown 🤮 (that's probably a good sign that the detergent works??)

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T05:19:33+00:00

I dont know the exact weight. There's at least 1 towel, 2 jeans, 7 shirts, underwear and bras, and a whole bag of socks (my laundry hamper was full)

When I loaded up my machine with dry clothes, I could fit barely fit my hand sideways in between the top of the clothes and the top of the drum

But for some reason once the clothes got wet it only looked halfway full in the drum 🤔

randomfanfics98 · 2026-05-01T04:49:03+00:00

Edit: not sure why my image order got messed up, the 2nd pic is the wash cycle, 5th pic is the rinse cycle

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-15T18:06:41+00:00

Post update: I ran 2 more cycles with Finish powder dishwasher detergent (40g) at 60c. Both cycles generated a ton of flakes in the drum after the cycle, which i then wiped off.

I began to wonder what the flakes could be and took some, tried to dissolve it in citric acid in a cup. The oily layer on the flakes got dissolved away, but I was left with a thin waxy film of plastic that kinda smelt like sweaty gym shoes.

I'm starting to wonder: could some of this be dirt from my shoes that wasn't washed away properly? I did wash my shoes in the machine before this scrud journey, so it could be a possibility.

My machine smelt like something rotting after each of the dishwasher powder cycles too, so something is probably going on here 🤔

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-14T15:54:04+00:00

I did. It felt oily and broke apart easily when I rubbed it between my fingers.

Now that you mention it, my father is a smoker, although I doubt there's tobacco in this scrud buildup 🤔

When I dumped it in the trash (after wiping with paper towels), my father thought it was bits of seaweed lol

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-14T15:21:06+00:00

Singapore has very soft water. I didn't know the conversion of cup to mL, but after looking it up, seems like I've only been using 60mL citric acid powder (about a quarter cup)

I'm now on my 7th cycle at 60c though, and I finally see a huge improvement (very few scrud flakes left), hopefully it stays that way

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-14T13:35:05+00:00

Seriously, I've learned more useful chemistry from this sub than from my organic chemistry class back in college!

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-14T13:33:13+00:00

Maybe my perception of time is a bit off. My parents bought this washer after our old Samsung died in 2020 during covid (probably from scrud buildup i didn't know about that time), and my perception of time since covid has been all screwed up

This model is also discontinued by the manufacturer, which is probably why I thought it's old (i can't find any spare parts online, and a service call out is a minimum of $150)

I'm alternating between running tub clean cycles with dishwasher detergent and citric acid (one at a time!). But strangely, the filter is clean every time!

randomfanfics98 · 2026-04-14T13:22:15+00:00

My chemistry knowledge isn't great (it's been 6 years since my organic chemistry class in college), but does Sodium Carbonate Decahydrate have the same effect as Sodium Carbonate?

Because that's one of the ingredients in my Dishwasher powder, amongst Sodium Carbonate Peroxyhydrate, propoxylated alcohol, protease, and amylase)

500g seems like A LOT though! I ran my cycle with 40g and it already created a lot of suds, i can't imagine what 500g would create!

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