How do you clean your work cloths?

I work all day with gas, diesel, and oils. The other day the chain lube cap came off on the chain saw and soaked my pants in bar oil. My wife hates the smell of diesel so I have to change cloths in the garage. She has tried Dawn dishwashing soap on the grease and vinegar on the diesel besides the normal wash. We can't get rid of the stains or the smell. What do you guys do?

Purex laundry detergent. Pour a little directly on the oil soaked area and then throw it in the washing machine. Seems to always get rid of the smell, but maybe not all of the stain. I don't worry about the stain 'cause it will probably happen again anyhow.

Working on construction equipment, mine get nasty on regular occasion. I cotton blend tee shirts most of the time, and Carhart jeans, so this is dealing with those two fabrics at least. Anyways, when I wash my work clothes I use Gain detergent, a scoop of Oxyclean, and a swirl of dish detergent.

I've yet to be able to get all of the stains out, even washing and rinsing on HOT, but I've never had a problem with the smells.

I do know when I wash the welders caps I wear I'll usually spray/soak them with one of the 'stain fighters' and that usually gets more of the stains out of them than not using it does. I could probably do the same on my pants but, the way I see it, they'll be dirty ten minutes after I start anyways, so a couple of stains aren't going to hurt a thing.

Try rubbing waterless hand cleaner into the fresh stain prior to washing. Nothing is 100%, but it works pretty good for me.

Simple Green works well, but it is hard on the clothes,,, some oil stains almost never come all the way out, I also fill the washer first and mix in what ever soap you chose to use, I do not use Hot water as it shrinks my blue jeans but do make sure it is very warm, baking soda added also helps with odors
cnt

Lots of ways of dealing with it and there's also a lot of different levels of filth on work clothes. No doubt you don't want those in the regular wash or the machine.

I would prefer to hand soak in a bucket or basin, using an appropriate detergent, solvent, stain remover and everyone has their favorite. Depending on how bad the work clothing is, eventually most of it will lift out and I can use the washing machine, mind you, just the work clothes. I try to reserve old clothing for the really nasty stuff like you mention, hand wash and take it from there. If you have a weeks worth, I'd be looking into a spare used washing machine and make sure it does not drain into your septic. Its amazing how much you can get out of the clothing with various methods. Big fan of pre-soaking.

One outfit where I worked, plenty of grease and oil to get on you, we had a uniform service, well worth it.

Looking at it another way, I try to find ways to not get covered in it, if at all possible, as it does make extra work having to launder heavily soiled articles of work clothing. I remember the boss mans mother giving me a reference one time, I spot checked her. They did notice that I would avoid or work a little more carefully so as not to get so filthy, she said, " He's a great driver/operator, just does not like to get dirty" LOL ! Had a friend call while I was on the spare hand set listening LOL ! i laughed like heck after, "she's right!" We had uniforms here eventually, but that never stopped the boss man, from having me crawl under every greasy dirty machine to lube or do what have you. All in good fun, I enjoyed working for them, they always treated me well in the paycheck. I run into him every so often now too, fun to look back, the one thing I remember is being treated fairly and generously, that and being filthy dirty at times, just that kind of work I suppose.

I rub waterless hand cleaner into bad spots and Oxy clean and Tide in water. I take my greasy clothes and chainsaw chaps to laundry mat and wash them there washer instead of using our washer at home.

rental uniforms let someone else worry.

There is a product called Odor-ban made in Warner Robins, Georgia that is very good at
taking care of petroleum and other odors in work clothes. it is found in Walmart a lot
of times and the local Sam's Club carries it in gallon jugs that is the concentrate. You can
add it as needed and it makes the clothes smell much better, If you put too much in the
wash water, it smells like they were overly perfumed for a couple of wash cycles before the
odor is gone.

I use a mix of things to get stains and smells out. I use dish soap shampoo and hand cleaner plug the normal washing liquid and so far that has worked well. Pour each on the stain area and let it soak in and then wash in hot water

I find it helps to "kill" most of the oil before washing garments. By killing oil I'm talking about the same thing as shampooing extremly dirty hair. A normal amount of shampoo won't even lather but after rinsing it out the secound application lathers very well. I keep liquid laundry detergent in a squirt top bottle that make's it easy to spot treat oil and stain spots. After spot traeting I run garment through a single short wash and spin. I then use a liitle more than normal detergent to run through a full cycle. As far as stains that will not come out,I find those are largly caused by drying clothes with stains in them. For that reason I line dry good jeans or shirts that get accidently soiled. If I can still see stain after line drying I might wear the garment then repeat spot treatment,wash and line dry. Once stain is gone the garment can be dryed in the machine in the future.

I agree on the hand cleaner on the stains with a glop dropped in the washer along with a couplea caps of Odoban we get at Sams Club. Standard amount of laundry detergent per load size.

I have a washer of my own for barn/work cloths , so my wife's nice cloths don't get spoiled by some grease or cow caca. Always pre soak really bad cloths first.

Throw them on the laundry room floor and they come back folded and clean. Stacked up on my side of the bed. I let my wife know when I have a bad stain.
Actually I normally wear a pair of coveralls over top of my regular clothes. Every week or so I throw them in the washer and spray a stain remover on the bad spots. It saves on my regular clothes. I put them on in the basement and take the off there before I come in the house along with my boots.

I used to have a old wringer washer to wash greasie oily cloths.lot of tide and let it beat for a hour.sometimes drained it and did it again.

Friend used to spread greasy coveralls in the driveway and pour Simple Green on them. Let them soak a while then used the pressure washer on them. Saved wear and tear on Moms' washing machine and also on Mom.

Change them everyday and they will not be so cruddy. I have seen men wearing the same greasy clothes day after day. I think they wait until the close can walk to the washer and then change them.

I soak them in purple power, then soak in dawn, then wash.

Liquid Bleach Alternative(A "Tide" product) plus 1/2 cup Borax, soak in HOT water, wash, double rinse. Gets most of the even really nasty stuff out.

For smaller grease spots, spray from the inside of clothes with brake cleaner.

For big spills (when the last bolt holding the transmission pan came down on me with 10 qts of fluid),
head to the local laundermat with a ton of soap.

Rick

I don't work hard enough anymore to get my clothes dirty. After a couple days they disappear and then they wind up in the dresser. The old woman handles those sort of things.

Hell, I gotta let the wife do Something!!! 8)

I have had good luck with Resolve - formerly Spray 'n' Wash. Add that to what other posters have told you, and no stain will stand a chance.

I just throw them in the washer with Wisk and hot water. Some stains like gear oil are hard to get out.

I throw some of that oxyguard in with the detergent and it does pretty good on the greasy stuff. I just have to remember and remove all the "evidence" from her washer before she gets home... :shock: Nothing like a red head going off on you when she throw her "good" clothes in the washer and it has some "stuff/grease/tar" still on the tub part.

Years ago I got some #6 Fuel oil on a practically new pair of dress pants.
I put some pre-diluted "Gunk" on the stains and threw them in with the rest of the wash.....couldn't even tell where the stains were!

Got a can of Coke pop? Friend of mine swears that's the best with your regular laundry detergent. Diesel or gear oil will be gone.

my wife sprays extreme orange car wash (fleet farm $4.00 gal) on grease and oil spots then throws in washer

I do what any man would do, I toss em in the hamper and let her worry about em!

Rick