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It was a rather suspiciously sunny-looking Sunday morning when Decay and I were doing the dishes at his place ... one of us commented on the observation that it seemed to take a lot more of detergent A to clean the dishes than it did using detergent B or detergent C (Palmolive suggested, not tested in this review) ...
With the one litre bottle of detergent A nearing the end of its useful life as a container for detergent, and with a ready and raring to be used one litre bottle of detergent B sitting in the cupboard below the sink, there was opportunity for some very unscientific testing to be done ...
Apparatus
- 2 x dirty plates, with caked-on remains of spaghetti dinner from a couple of nights ago
- The remaining amount of detergent A: Trix (Approximately $AUD2.95 from whatever supermarket you choose to swear allegiance to...)
- A freshly opened bottle of detergent B: Morning Fresh (On Special for $AUD5.00 when we went shopping last Wednesday night @ Chadstone Coles...)
- A sink, with attached tap handles and water connections
- A dish-rack, to hold cleaned specimens, courtesy of the House of K
- A tea-towel
Method
- Fill sink with warm water.
- Take one dirty plate, submerge in warm water, then squirt a small amount of detergent (approximately diameter of a five-cent $AUD piece) onto the dirty but watered plate.
- Attempt to clean plate. Add more detergent as required, noting the amount used.
- Place on dish-rack, in waiting to be dried with the tea-towel.
- Repeat with second plate, and other brand of detergent.
Results
It was found that it took about 2 squirts of detergent A and a fair amount of elbow grease to clean the first plate, and one squirt of detergent B with the same kind of effort to clean the second plate. Neither of the detergents felt up to being particularly sudsy or bubbly at this time of the day, or perhaps there wasn't enough detergent in the mix to have much of a suds party going ...
Discussion
Although it seems like detergent B may be more *effective* than detergent A, this result may have been biased by the fact that the water in the sink was not changed between the washing of the first and second plates. This came about after a discussion with Decay about water usage while cleaning dishes, and how if one kept the water running, or changed the water in the sink frequently, the water bill per month for this humble abode may reach heights of over $AUD10.00 per month, when the bill for the last month reached just over $AUD6.00 ... A decision was made at this point to attempt to minimise the water wastage not only because of the aforementioned water bill, but because it's good for the environment save the dolphins or indeterminate sexual orientation and also those trees etc etc ... However, this may or may not have much effect on the outcome of the cleanliness of the second plate, but we'll never know unless we go ahead and risk the lives of a couple of swimmy thingies in the sea at the end of the sewerage pipes ...
Measurements of the amount of detergent used in each case are also a bit fuzzy ... it's rather difficult to get a precise amount of detergent out of a nearly finished bottle when you have to keep turning it upside down and flinging it with the lid closed so that what remaining detergent is near the exit hole ... you take what you get ... it's also rather difficult to get a precise amount of detergent out of a mostly full bottle, when you turn it upside down and gravity gets the better of the contents of the bottle ... yeah yeah *grumble* *mumble* *unscientific* *cough* ...
Conclusion
At this point of the game, we conclude that Morning Fresh appeared to be a more effective dishwashing detergent than Trix. No comparisons have been made with respect to the cleaning prowess of either detergents with glasses, mugs, tupperware-clone containers, mini-woks, saucepans, frypans, cutlery, or anything else found residing in Decay's kitchen ... The truth remains to be seen whether less Morning Fresh is used than Trix, over 5 weekends (the time it took for the bottle of Trix to be finished). We'll see in about a month's time whether the approximately 69% increase in price between detergent A and detergent B is worth it ...
This has been a highly unscientific report brought to you by the letter Q and the number 9. Or something.
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