How long does washing take to dry?

[sweetpea]

The damp air in the Waikato can mean it takes days for some things to dry, hence the drier to take the last bit of it out of the clothes.

True here, too. If you don't have a dryer, you can put your still-a-little-damp clothes in the airing cupboard (ie, above/around the hot water heater). Or, if you're a lazy student, just keep em hanging up under the carport till the morning you need them

[jubjub]

but I won't put my knickers on there.

Just as well, my neighbour did and they got nicked!

[YouMeAndThree]

Neighbour says that putting cloth nappies on the line overnight on a clear frosty night is really good for them and makes them uber-white... old wives tale or what?

I use cloth nappies on my youngest (I'm still thought of as an oddity in UK, probably will be in NZ too ) and agree that frost is good for them. It can help to soften them up. However, it's not the frost which gets them white, it's the sunshine. In fact the sun is a great, natural stain remover and I recommend it for all stains (especially as baby food is often orange and their clothes nice and pale )

To me there is nothing better than seeing a line full of nappies or sheets blowing in the breeze ........... sad or what, LOL.

[chocolate cake]

I'm guessing she means not permitted in a tenancy agreement or suchlike. I've lived in an apartment block where you weren't allowed to hang things outside to dry, and had to either put it all on an airer inside and hope it would dry, or use the tumble drier.

Yeah, I've rented a place where this was the case before.

In the UK, I always used to hang things inside over radiators etc. that it isn't an option here, what's a radiator for a start!

Just getting used to hanging things out, I find the windy dry days, or scorching sun days best for drying things.

I haven't heard the one about overnight in the frost doing the same.

Not heard of frost bleaching things, but I remember things freezing solid when I hung things out to dry while camping in Nepal some years ago.

[jonSE]

Was a clothes line virgin until the age of about 5 - tooo long ago.

The reason that frost helps is because it freezes the remaining moisture in the clothes. Ice is 4% bigger than the water it came from so the freezing action will "lift" the microscopic dirt particles out of the fabric. Same reason that if you leave a field with no visible stones on the surface to lie fallow for 10 years or so in the UK when you return it will have stones on the surface.

I remember trying to dry beach towels when on holiday in Fiji. No chance at all you could leave them out all day in 40C plus and they still be damp when you brought them in. Something to do with 100% humidity me thinks. You couldn't get dry when you got out of the shower either even with a dry towel.

[dilanium]

Why were they illegal ?

Well our neighbourhoods declared them an eyesore. You would get a fine if you had one out.

[Mels]

Just as well, my neighbour did and they got nicked!

It's even more embarrassing when your 'smalls' (or 'littles' as we call them) get blown down the road in a strong wind and you have to go and claim them

Mels

[marybelle]

If the washing needs drying and its raining outside but not cold enough to put the radiators on, I put the de-humidifier on and put the clothes horse in front of it.
Mine will dry a full load in a couple of hours!
Mind you, if hubby would let me have a tumble drier things would be done alot quicker!!

[JandM]

It's even more embarrassing when your 'smalls' (or 'littles' as we call them) get blown down the road in a strong wind and you have to go and claim them

Mels

I was once in France with a school party, and inside an old World War II gun emplacement, one of the girls found a carrier bag containing a knicker-whipper's haul. I felt a right nellie going to the local police and handing in 30+ items of assorted ladies' underwear!

[marcia]

I'm with Julie on the crisp towels - hate them! But don't want to waste money using the tumble dryer to dry them from scratch, so I hang them out till they are nearly done then give thme a blast in the dryer to fluff them up.

I always hang my washing out, (only try to do washing on fine days) except for socks and undies - I wait till I have a full load of just socks and undies (doesn't tke long with 5 of us!) and the whole load then goes in the tumble dryer, even in the summer!! I'm not spending half an hour hanging out a weeks worth of socks and undies for five people!!

I usually end up bringing the washing in and finsihing it of on the clothes horses over night - have to get it sorted and put away the next day - I hate the sight of it hanging around!