Many people are querying why no washing machines on sale in the UK today are
both hot and cold fill. There are many reasons which will be detailed below, but you
may be surprised to know that it is only the UK that seems to ask for this facility and
manufacturers are unlikely to produce a specific washing machine for the UK only,
as most manufacturers design and sell to either the European or global markets.
Previously there were a couple of manufacturers who produced hot fill machines,
but they were UK companies. However, these companies are now mainly owned by
Italian manufacturers, so no longer offer this option.
One of the 1st washing machines of Constructa (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
It is fair to say that the hot fill programme options were fairly limited at the time.
Why are there no hot fill washing machines
Washing machines are far more complicated than they used to be, and offer many
more programmes, each with a different temperature as we know. The hot water
that we produce in our homes is generally of a much higher temperature than that
used to wash our clothes.
There would probably only be one or may two programmes that would call for hot
water at such a high temperature, which would make the process impractical.
Hot water in our homes is generally produced either by a Combination Boiler or
stored in a hot water tank though our central heating systems. Either way, this
means that any water called off by the washing machine would have have to travel
through the pipes in our home. The result would be that the machine would be filled
from the cold water that is standing in the pipes, and drawing hot water into the
pipes, that would be left to get cold. Not an economical proposition.
At home, we normally to run the hot water tap for a time to run off the cold water in
the pipes first and, depending on the system you use, this could be from a minute or
two up to about 5 minutes, depending how far the hot water has to travel.
Therefore, the washing machine would be filled with this cold water, and the heater
would have to come into operation to heat it up to the right temperature.
If you did have a system, however, that was able to transfer your domestic hot water
into the washing machine, the water would conversely be far too hot for most of our
clothes, and would actually damage them.
You also need to take into account the detergents that are used in modern washing
machines. If you use a biological detergent and the water temperature is above 40
Degrees, the enzymes in the detergent will be damaged and will not work.
In theory having a hot fill machine seems to make perfect sense but up to this time,
in practice, it is not a workable system. However, in future, as more research is
carried out into green energy, this may well become both practical and economical to
use.
