Laundry Plus Heating?

[Zardnaar]

There is a stigma in the US connected to hanging clothes outside. "What? You cannot afford a dryer?" None-the-less, many people still do. Some HOAs though do not allow it because hanging clothes out would diminish the quality of life in the neighborhood.....

It's kinda seen as lazy and wasteful here if you don't hang your clothes outside.

Maybe that's just the Scottish heritage.

Obviously if you're in an apartment yeah dryer and clothing racks.

Using the dryer your clothes smell a bit funny, alot fresher outside.

 

[Socrates99]

There's a good 4-5 months a year when hanging clothes just wouldn't work here. Maybe that's why @MaryKB doesn't know many who do it. Not sure I'd call a dryer a luxury.

 

[Naskra]

Laundry goes out on the line, HOA be damned. Cooling by ceiling fans, heat by video cards.

 

[red_elk]

Windows are 4mm thick glass not double or triple glazed.

I've installed something like this, don't remember exact model:

No problem with -30C outside, and I'm pretty sure they won't freeze in -40 as well.
Probably overkill for your climate, but anyway, good windows will save a lot of energy and money if you don't have central heating.

 

[Zardnaar]

I've installed something like this, don't remember exact model:

No problem with -30C outside, and I'm pretty sure they won't freeze in -40 as well.
Probably overkill for your climate, but anyway, good windows will save a lot of energy and money if you don't have central heating.

Yeah that's triple glazing. Used to make it. Old houses generally have 4mm single pane, double glazing 4mm or 5mm glass and triple glazing very rare.

Here mostly a waste of money unless you have put a lot if effort into the rest of the house. Spend $20000 for 11% reduction on your heating.

One of those videos I watched in Russia sowed a construction site for Russian house.

Really thick walks and triple glazing by default. Half the country here first is kinda rae and where I live -7 is really cold.

Cold parts of country similar to England, warm parts Florida. Most parts somewhere in the middle.

People want a new house or 1970s or earlier retrofitted brick house.

The deregulated in the 80s and 90s houses seen as a bit mickey mouse.

That window looks better than what we have, the glass more or less goes into the frame as is. New builds might have the water drainage at the bottom.

 

[Birdjaguar]

There's a good 4-5 months a year when hanging clothes just wouldn't work here. Maybe that's why @MaryKB doesn't know many who do it. Not sure I'd call a dryer a luxury.

Long ago we lived outside of Anson ME. It was before children. We hung the clothes out there year around. In winter they did freeze, but evaporation happened even when frozen so eventually, they dried. We heated with wood, so if then came in still damp, they dried quickly.

 

[really]

I have a line outside for hanging things.
Weather is unreliable so so sometimes the clothes get an extra rinse cycle.

Have a dryer which is used in the winter.
Mostly just use a rack which is kept in the utility - my house has a ventilation system that sucks the damp air out of the utility, bathrooms and kitchen and blows in fresh air and recycles the heat.

I have triple glazing and heavy insulation so don't need much heating - I have electric underfloor heating which has been fine.
I also have a stove which I've never lit.
Only been in the house a year and it wasn't a cold winter last year so it wasn't a big test.

I have solar panels too which heats the water if not being used by the house.

My biggest problem is overheating in the summer- I have lots of windows facing the sun and it heats up. Will have to get some shade to keep it out.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Central heating, they keep temperature ~20+ C, self-regulating depending on weather outside. I pay for it something about 30$ per month, from October to April.
Washing machine in bathroom, hang dry. Pretty standard for Russia.

That's how we did it in the summer in the house I lived in on the acreage. We had a dryer in the basement, but only used it in the winter.

Ice on windows means your windows lack proper thermal insulation. We had this problem in our old apartment.
In my current one, when I did renovation, I installed windows which don't freeze and also block outside sounds pretty well. More expensive, but worth it.

I prefer to hear outside sounds. I'm inside most of the time, so I need to hear birds. I miss all the birdsong and squirrel chatter from the house I last lived in. Our back yard had fruit trees and my dad arranged things so the squirrels could easily get all around the perimeter without touching the ground. Their home was the crabapple tree, though.

We have noticed a decline in the quality of clothes pins over the years.

Yep. The only thing they're good for anymore is art projects. They're useless for hanging up clothes, unless you use the very expensive metal ones.

There is a stigma in the US connected to hanging clothes outside. "What? You cannot afford a dryer?" None-the-less, many people still do. Some HOAs though do not allow it because hanging clothes out would diminish the quality of life in the neighborhood.....

Same excuse they use here. The notion in the minds of TPTB is that nobody will want to rent here if they see laundry on the balconies. I guess it's okay to see bikes, tires, patio furniture, barbecues, toys, and other stuff all in a clutter.

You can completely eliminate your cost of living and carbon footprint if you go live in a cave and subsist on boulder moss

Some of us enjoy our luxuries XD

You should try sun/wind-dried laundry at least once in your life. The fresh smell is amazing. After all, aren't solar and wind power the new trendy thing?

Mine too is vertically loaded and has drying function (clothes are however still little wet when pulled out) . It's not that big however.

Hey elk I was wondering if You remember this one ? :

Spoiler Pralka Frania :

My great-aunt had one of those, and I remember being corralled to help with the laundry one time... and getting my hand temporarily stuck in the rollers.

It hurt. A lot.

A lot of people here associate clotheslines with like a "trailer park" sort of vibe, so if you live in an upscale subdivision with a Homeowners Association it makes sense that they would want to maintain a certain aesthetic in the neighborhood

It's bad enough here, being told what I can and can't do - like put up shelves, have non-beige walls, need permission to have safety bars, be told they'd really prefer I not put up pictures on the walls (to hell with that one; I need my grandmother's paintings and my dad's wood carvings for my peace of mind)... I don't see why people would have a problem with laundry. At least the people do laundry.

Other cleaning things:
- I don't have a vacuum. I just use a broom. Though I should probably get a swiffer or mop or something.
- I have a dish washer that I rarely run. I usually hand wash my dishes and use the dish washer as a big drying rack.

Swiffer mops are wonderful inventions. No squeezing, no stringy messes... just remember that they need 4 AA batteries to run.

I use my dishwasher as extra storage for canned food. Right now that's where I keep my canned soup and veggies. There's not a lot of cupboard space in the kitchens here.

Here we have one coin-operated washer and dryer for the entire apartment building. One of our neighbours sometimes dumps other's wet clothes on the floor if she wants to use it. Nobody likes her. No place for a clothesline so sometimes wet clothes go up on the shower curtain pole.

My housekeeping helper removes other people's clothes if their laundry cycle is up and they haven't removed it themselves. She reasons that if she can use a timer, so can they.

Of course it's a different thing if the washing or drying is still in progress. That's an obnoxious thing to do.

Threads busier than I thought. Such a dumb simple question but it looks like in in the minority lol.

Everyone does laundry, so everyone has an opinion.

 

[Zardnaar]

That's how we did it in the summer in the house I lived in on the acreage. We had a dryer in the basement, but only used it in the winter.


I prefer to hear outside sounds. I'm inside most of the time, so I need to hear birds. I miss all the birdsong and squirrel chatter from the house I last lived in. Our back yard had fruit trees and my dad arranged things so the squirrels could easily get all around the perimeter without touching the ground. Their home was the crabapple tree, though.


Yep. The only thing they're good for anymore is art projects. They're useless for hanging up clothes, unless you use the very expensive metal ones.


Same excuse they use here. The notion in the minds of TPTB is that nobody will want to rent here if they see laundry on the balconies. I guess it's okay to see bikes, tires, patio furniture, barbecues, toys, and other stuff all in a clutter.


You should try sun/wind-dried laundry at least once in your life. The fresh smell is amazing. After all, aren't solar and wind power the new trendy thing?


My great-aunt had one of those, and I remember being corralled to help with the laundry one time... and getting my hand temporarily stuck in the rollers.

It hurt. A lot.


It's bad enough here, being told what I can and can't do - like put up shelves, have non-beige walls, need permission to have safety bars, be told they'd really prefer I not put up pictures on the walls (to hell with that one; I need my grandmother's paintings and my dad's wood carvings for my peace of mind)... I don't see why people would have a problem with laundry. At least the people do laundry.


Swiffer mops are wonderful inventions. No squeezing, no stringy messes... just remember that they need 4 AA batteries to run.

I use my dishwasher as extra storage for canned food. Right now that's where I keep my canned soup and veggies. There's not a lot of cupboard space in the kitchens here.


My housekeeping helper removes other people's clothes if their laundry cycle is up and they haven't removed it themselves. She reasons that if she can use a timer, so can they.

Of course it's a different thing if the washing or drying is still in progress. That's an obnoxious thing to do.


Everyone does laundry, so everyone has an opinion.

It's just interesting that there's a bare handful of posters who hand it up outside.

I understand if you live in NYC or Canada I suppose.

On the clothes peg things in the 80s we had ye olde wooden ones. They would break eventually. You use the new ones on thin fabric and the older ones on towels. Haven't seen them for years now though.

If you're used to dryer only you may not notice it but it's a bit of amusty some. You're not really gonna notice it unless you stick your face in a pile of fresh washing and it's not bad by any means.

Warm day with a bit western your heavy stuff dries in less than an hour (denim, towels) and stuff like boxer shorts dry in 10 minutes.

 

[red_elk]

I prefer to hear outside sounds. I'm inside most of the time, so I need to hear birds.

In good modern windows there is an option to let sound and a little air in, even if you don't want to open them. Sealing them off completely is good for really cold weather and if you want some quietness. Won't help with noisy neighbors of course.

 

[AdamCrock]

Warm day with a bit western your heavy stuff dries in less than an hour (denim, towels) and stuff like boxer shorts dry in 10 minutes.

I bet @Birdjaguar 's stuff dries even faster since He lives in a desert.

edit:

In good modern windows there is an option to let sound and a little air in, even if you don't want to open them.

I don't know for sure about other countries but I think it's per regulation that windows need to have an option to "unseal" them when using any sort of gas installation. Gas leaks have killed a lot of people over the years so it is advisable to unseal Your windows when going to sleep even in winter. I know that windows in my block have that option , You just need to move the handle in a certain position and they are not airtight (they're being pulled out of a rubber seal)

 

[really]

It can take more than a day to dry something heavy outside here.

I only get ice on the outside of windows thankfully these days, when I was young my parents only had single glazing and getting ice on the inside was never good.

 

[Zardnaar]

I bet @Birdjaguar 's stuff dries even faster since He lives in a desert.

edit:


I don't know for sure about other countries but I think it's per regulation that windows need to have an option to "unseal" them when using any sort of gas installation. Gas leaks have killed a lot of people over the years so it is advisable to unseal Your windows when going to sleep even in winter. I know that windows in my block have that option , You just need to move the handle in a certain position and they are not airtight (they're being pulled out of a rubber seal)

Maybe it's not just heat though but wind.

Hot gusty wind crossing the Tasman from Aussie sucks the moisture right out.

Cold South wester off antarctica gonna freeze your nuts off.

It's not that could where I live on the thermostat but it's a damp cold. Go inland it's a dry cold micro climate and it can hit -20 over there in a certain spot.

South Islands really funny. It's a bit smaller than Florida but there's several climate types here plus microclimates. A valley can have a different climate than the surrounding area.

Half hour drive north and rainfall halves.

 

[Narz]

Have washer/dryer units in my apartment

Barely need heat in Florida, probably run heat 5-10 days a year if that. I have baseboard heaters in my room controlled by a knob on the wall, if its a cold night I might cozy up the room before bed and then turn on again to heat it up in the morning.

 

[Socrates99]

Long ago we lived outside of Anson ME. It was before children. We hung the clothes out there year around. In winter they did freeze, but evaporation happened even when frozen so eventually, they dried. We heated with wood, so if then came in still damp, they dried quickly.

Funny how times change, now a fireplace is the luxury. I suppose we could hang them in the basement next to the gas fireplace but that'd use more gas than our dryer does.

At any rate, family of five with both parents employed full time. Can't wait for frozen clothes to dry.

 

[Zardnaar]

Funny how times change, now a fireplace is the luxury. I suppose we could hang them in the basement next to the gas fireplace but that'd use more gas than our dryer does.

At any rate, family of five with both parents employed full time. Can't wait for frozen clothes to dry.

I miss the open fires in the house. Last seen 25 odd years ago.

 

[elmurcis]

Living in log house. Burning my own wood for heat (I guess some fifteen cubicmeters per season... usually have enough (40-50 m3) for 3 seasons (yup, I have heat for 20/21; 21/22 and 22/23 season in place )). Clothes in dry time hang on outside (between two apple-trees). During winter/rainy time have un-heated 2nd floor of house where can hang as many clothes as I would possibly get). Dries pretty quickly (some heat that escapes from 1st floor and also roof above (metal) can heat up air from sunlight during day).

 

[Zardnaar]

Living in log house. Burning my own wood for heat (I guess some fifteen cubicmeters per season... usually have enough (40-50 m3) for 3 seasons (yup, I have heat for 20/21; 21/22 and 22/23 season in place )). Clothes in dry time hang on outside (between two apple-trees). During winter/rainy time have un-heated 2nd floor of house where can hang as many clothes as I would possibly get). Dries pretty quickly (some heat that escapes from 1st floor and also roof above (metal) can heat up air from sunlight during day).

Wood takes a while to dry.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

Washing machine and dryer for clothes. I've never known anyone IRL who puts their clothes outside to dry.

I never understood why anyone wouldn't just hang their clothes out to dry (unless the weather doesn't comply, obv). It's literally free of charge (as opposed to the drier), it's much nicer for the fabric, it's much better for the environment and it's one big household utensil you don't need to splurge money and more importantly space for. It's not even that time-intensive, I usually need like 5 minutes for one machine full of clothes.

You can completely eliminate your cost of living and carbon footprint if you go live in a cave and subsist on boulder moss

Technically, you would still be breathing, which is CO2..

This argument always gets me though..

"What, you don't put your central heating on in summer? You don't fly a plane instead of using public transport? You actually walk to the grocer? You don't have the TV running while in another room? Might as well live in a cave!" yeah.. nah. Being the least bit responsible isn't the same as rejecting modernity.

 

[Zardnaar]

Cultures a bit different lol and it's just such a basic thing.

Think the dryer is just gathering dust can't remember the last time we used it and just got through winter here.

Used drying racks plus hear pump plus dehumidifier I suppose. Dryers for emergencies let me the weather is terrible or you need work clothes dry asap.

3 degrees outside, heat pumps off. Getting a bit nippy now.

Sexy flannelette shirt, 90s never ended, throw blanket plus cat.

Plenty warm, cat sodded off though.