Front loader washing machines are notorious for growing mold and mildew on the door seal so they need extra attention to help mitigate these issues. Here’s how to help keep them clean! https://wellnessmama.com/natural-home/clean-washing-machine/ Katie’s family uses a top loader Speed Queen which doesn’t have the problems HE front loaders do.

I know some people pick ivy leaves and wash their laundry with that and say it works wonderful. Also have you heard of Nancy Birtwhistle? She has incredible natural green ways to clean your home. She has authored 4 books on the subject packed with recipes.

Simple recipe:

Equal parts of baking soda and organic extra virgin coconut oil (NOT denatured).
Mix together until we’ll-blended and use as needed.
Coconut oil melts at 76 degrees, so if your home is warmer than 76 degrees, put it in the fridge during the summer.

Since this is a dry powder adding liquid soap will likely cause it to clump and not clean as well.

If you want to use the powdered recipe it doesn’t need any Sal Suds.

Fast forward 4 years to 2024, and now Sal Suds costs anywhere from $20 – $36 per 32 oz. bottle. Even less of a bargain than when you posted in 2020.

Thank you so much for this! I ordered everything last night but was able to research it and cancel it just now after this comment. I appreciate it!

No, you would be adding doubling the soap that way which would likely create too many suds for an HE machine. You would either use the borax free recipe or the laundry soap recipe seperately.

I make the liquid laundry soap and I use 12 oz. of liquid castile soap to make five gallons of soap. I found the calculations here:

https://www.lisabronner.com/liquid-vs-bar-in-dr-bronners-pure-castile-soap/

Volume of actual soap
I don’t know how to de-math this, but people who put together their own recipes for cleaners might want to know this. Bar soaps are 5% water; liquids are 61%. The chemistry is a little different for both, but considering that a bar of soap weighs 5 oz, and thus 4.75 oz of it is soap, you would need 12.18 ounces (a little over 1 ½ c.) of liquid soap to equal the soap content of a 5 oz bar. Doing the math the other way, 1 cup of liquid soap equals approximately 2/3 of a bar (or 3.64 oz.) of Dr. B’s bar soap.

There can be problems with SLS, but there are also a couple of different sources of it. Katie is comfortable using it as a cleaner. This article explains more https://www.lisabronner.com/there-is-no-cancer-risk-from-sls-sodium-lauryl-sulfate/

I have used vinegar as a softener for about 7 years and have never had a problem. My washer is sparkly clean with no mold or mildew problems. I think the vinegar helps keep it clean. I do leave the washer door open to air out after each load though.