I have been asked to wash towels, dishcloths and oven mitts for a local café. These items have gray stains from the restaurant’s aluminum baking pans. They soak the towels, but the cloths and mitts are badly stained.
What can I use to get this laundry white again? Chlorine bleach will remove some but not all of the stains. I have tried pre-treating with a degreaser, but I still can’t get all of the stains out. Do you have any suggestions?
If the stains are caused by the aluminum in the baking pans, your best bet is to pre-soak the dishcloths and oven mitts with hydrogen peroxide, not with chlorine bleach. Use a 1 percent to 2 percent mixture, with warm to hot water.
Let the items soak for about two or three hours. Aluminum is very difficult to remove. And chlorine simply doesn’t have the same effect on metals as hydrogen peroxide. After soaking the items, run them through a typical wash cycle. With this method, your results should be better.
I have two self-service laundries, both of which do a great deal of wash-dry-fold laundry. However, I’m always having problems with oil and grease stains. Could you give me some advice on how to remove those tough oil and grease spots that we occasionally encounter?
There are some great products on the market that are specially formulated to deal with oil and grease stains. One of them is called Laundry Wetspo. It’s available through your local laundry and drycleaning supplier, and it’s simple to use in your laundromat’s washers.
In a 40- to 50-pound washer, use six to eight ounces of Laundry Wetspo, in conjunction with your laundry detergent, in a hot-water wash cycle. This should take care of nearly any grease or oil stains you may come across.
After washing garments with this product, the clothes may have a slight petroleum smell; however, that should dissipate after running the items through a normal drying cycle. If the odor lingers, rewash the garments using detergent and bleach.
Always be sure to check the care labels of the garments in question before undertaking any stain-treating procedure.
