Advantages of the wringer washer
When
we embarked on the East Wing project, Mark floated the idea of using a
bit of the extra space opened up in the trailer to put in a modern
washing machine. At first, the idea seemed okay, but the more I
thought about it, the more I clung to my wringer
washer.
On summer days, doing
laundry in the wringer washer is pure joy.
I sink my hands in the soapy water to pull out a shirt, pass it through
the wringer into the rinse water, then back through the wringer into
the laundry basket. Later, I hang up the load in the sunniest
spot of the yard, shared by our three bee hives, and the workers come
to explore the damp clothing. Now and then, a guard bee gets
pissed off at me working five feet from her door and she buzzes me
until I back off a bit, before trying again.
In
the winter, laundry can be a bit tricky, but the experience is almost more enjoyable.
Once the laundry basket starts to fill up, I scan the ten day weather
forecast looking for the most sunny, beautiful day. Here in zone
6, there's generally at least one beautiful day per
month, even in the dead of winter, and looking forward to laundry on
that day makes it extra special. Since we dry our clothes
on the line, we need that warm day anyway to suck moisture from the
clean clothes, and I suspect that if we got a washing machine, I'd soon
be ignoring the weather and buying a drier. Meanwhile, wringing
each piece of clothing by hand reminds me to wear our clothes
until they're truly dirty rather than dropping a clean sweather in the
laundry basket after one light wearing. Plus, the wringer washer
drains completely by gravity, so it can be left outside all winter
rather than taking up heated space in the house.
I know that Mark was
trying to save me work by offering a modern
washing machine, but right now I feel like I don't want to set foot on
that slippery slope. Maybe I'll change my tune in February....
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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it would be cool to see lady with washer-extractor and twist to see the clothes. Did you ever get anything caught in a wringer?
Jullie --- Our wringer has a safety feature where it pops open if something large goes in. The downside is that you can't wring out jeans, but it makes it safer and less scary, so nothing gets stuck. If I'm not paying attention, though, a sock sometimes keeps going around and around the wringer instead of coming out the other side, but I just reverse the direction and it comes right off.
Roland --- Great idea! We're definitely on the search for a good biochar crusher, and that sounds like a top option!