Anyone else have problems with Country Save?

[xbabymamax]

I am seriously soooo sick of the dang ammonia and rashes.

I boiled the diapers a few times and still get the ammonia smell. I am using disposables and don't really know if I will go back to cloth diapers.

I started CDing my then 1 year old ( now 3.5 years old) and ended up getting HORRIBLE ammonia problems. I gave up after about 5 months.

With my new baby, I CD'ed for 4.5 months and it was going pretty good until just recently and I had to boil the diapers. then washed once or twice and had to boil them again... then again..

Its just not right. How come some people can do just fine with their diapers and I always have problems?!!?!?!?!?!?!?

I started using the problem diapers from DS1 for DS2 and I seem to have more problems with them. I just really don't want to fork out more $$$ for new dipes when I dont know if I will be successfull with them. KWIM?

I have hard water, a top loader (small stacked washer/dryer) prefolds and flats, use country save and liquid calgon, washed about every 2-3 days
wash routine is as follows:
Presoak about 40 minutes followed by prewash on cold
Hot wash/ COld rinse with appx 1 scoop Country save and 1 capfull of calgon.
Followed by cold wash/ cold rinse and repeated until they seem rinsed well.
Sometimes it takes a few of the cold wash/rinse before I think they are probably ok.

Even when I wasn't having ammonia smell, Baby would have rashes in cloth diapers. He gets rashes in sposies, too though.

Thoughts?
:

[Adsullata]

We don't have really hard water, but I use country save and haven't had problems. I have a frontloader, but have washed in top loaders as well.

I suggest putting the detergent in at the very beginning, with the cold presoak. That works best for me as I find the detergent works better at stains in the cold, and then by the time you get to the hot wash, it works to help rinse out the diapers better.

Maybe try not using the calgon every time too. I read that it's better to use it biweekly, or once a month.

You could try a tablespoon or two of baking soda (acts as a mild water softener) with your detergent (again, in the presoak), and then vinegar in your second (cold) full cycle. You don't need very much vinegar at all, for a top loader maybe 1/4 cup at most? and make sure you add it to the wash, not the rinse- works better. The vinegar helps rinse out detergents, odors. Make sure you remove any PUL from this part tho because vinegar will break down the PUL.

Last, have you tried washing a little more frequently? I find if I wash about 18-20 diapers or so at a time, they come out much better. Another thing I discovered was Not closing the lid on my pail. The air getting to the dipes prevents sooo much more ammonia buildup and I found that the pail hardly smells (if at all) when I leave it open.

HTH

[xbabymamax]

Thank you for your reply!
Sorry that It has taken me so long to get back to you.

I am going to take your advice and try to work some things out.

thank you!@!!

[chely7425]

I have super hard water and a normal top loader and just had to switch from Country Save.. as much as I hate it the only thing that works for us is Tide. I use the powder. I do a cold rinse, a hot wash with calgon and tide, another hot wash.

[SuzyLee]

I use(d) CS and had tons of problems. But I switched back to SportWash and am still having problems. I just cannot get rid of teh ammonia stink. We have hard water too.

I hate CD's some days.

[Michigan Mama]

No experience with hard water here, but I will say that Country Save says to use 1/2 scoop for cloth dipes and I found I actually did better with a bit less than that. My washer drum isn't that big, though. For that reason, I also wash pretty frequently (daily for 2 in dipes) because if I put too much in my machine, they don't clean well.

My other thought is that I've found that hot rinses get detergent out much better than cold rinses. My routine looks like this (we have a TL, too). cold rinse, hot wash with about 1/3 scoop country save, then 1-3 hot rinses, depending on if I've noticed any ammonia smell. I don't have a hot rinse cycle on my machine, so I usually set it to hot wash, then try to catch it and spin it out after the wash cycle.

I have been using vinegar occas - I put it in the cold rinse at the beginning (sometimes with a little soaking time). I only use like 1/2 cup and do it maybe every 10 days or 2 wks or so.

hope you get something figured out!

[octobermom]

country save did not work for us. Horrible rashes

Deanna

[Katie T]

I swear by Charlies soap. I know people say they get rashes from it but I have a dd with very sensitive skin and this is the best! You do have to wash everything in it (normal everyday laundry) and make sure to strip your machine but I have never found something that works so great in out really hard water. I so a cold rinse then a hot wash with one scoop of cs I stop it half way threw agitation and let it sit 30 minutes or whenever I remember to restart itThen I let the cycle finish and so 1 or 2 hot washes with no soap as a rinse since I dont have that setting on my machine. I have found that cold rinses do nothing so get rid of residue or rinseing out detergent. Good luck I remember how frustrating it is!