Should detergents for Soft Water users be different?

ruff

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Ofer Kolton
Manufacturers create cleaning detergents for a very wide range of circumstances across the country.

For example they incorporate chemicals that soften the water.

Will those of us who use a water softeners in their van, be better served with products designed particularly for soft water?

Manufacturers?
 

Dolly Llama

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Larry Capitoni
kolfer1 said:
Will those of us who use a water softeners in their van, be better served with products designed particularly for soft water?

no more than the folks that have water softeners in their homes, Ofer
Laundry and dish detergent is the same.
You just use less soap with conditioned water

but I'll defer to the guys that "really" know .....Shawn, where you at?


.L.T.A.
 
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Shawn Forsythe
Theoretically, the answer is ...yes. Provided an unlikely set of circumstances were to prevail.

In reality, it won't make much of a difference for soft water users in some cases, and in others it would. Some detergent emulsifier formulations don't use specific purpose softeners/chelators, like NTA and EDTA, while others simply rely on the mild softening effects of the builders that are employed.

Taking them (the specif purpose chelators) out of products that contain them might yield a small significant cost savings of a couple of dollars in a 40 lb bucket to the end user, but negligible in cost per square foot. Then also you might want to factor in the makeup of contaminants in the soiling which would be positively interacted by the inclusion of chelation agents (specific purpose softeners). Soil is too varied to want to lose that effect where it can be had.

I'd opt for using and keeping them in any case, even for soft water users.





p.s. Mind you, these thoughts were written without regard for the minor controversy between the use of NTA versus EDTA. NTA is considered by some to be a health hazard but is a much better cleaning agent additive from an efficacy and efficiency standpoint.
 

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