Drying clothes

[vtsailguy]

I have been thinking about the towels myself. I have have three boys and the clothes are not a problem, but we always seem to have wet towels.

I was going to see if I could look online for a cheap towel sized shamwow type fabric. I have a small one and it dries in minutes.

[barnakiel]

There is very little salt spray in marinas. And most marinas have dryers.

b.

[Jacko]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

The only time there is any significant salt is when it is blowing 30+ knots and it is way too windy then for any washing to remain hung up anyway .

Watch out hanging light coloured items on the lifelines, as occasionally faint rust marks can appear under the spot the clothes were pegged.

Hi Lass I too had the rust problems on washing but have just fitted Dynema life lines "problem gone" cheers Jacko

[thinwater]

Originally Posted by xeon_tsd

Well the wife so far is doing well with packing up the family and sailing off.... EXCEPT... she wants a friggen dryer. She is convinced that we cant dry clothes with out them becoming encrusted in salt.

Any help, thoughts, suggestions????

Has she tried it?

[DumnMad]

When we have wet days Roe just uses the dehumidifier & curtains off the bow. Works well. Some dryers just transfer the water to other parts of the boat.

[Hudson Force]

Controlling the damp also means controlling the salt. Since salt will absorb moisture, once you use a towel to dry off salt water from your skin or once you lay upon your sheets without a fresh water rinse, your towels and sheets will never fully dry until they are fresh water washed. We regularly bathe in the ocean, but then complete a final fresh water rinse from a bucket kept on the stern before drying with a towel. We never enter our cockpit when we are salty and never bring salty below!

[Amapola]

We had a 110v dryer when we bought Amapola. It took forever to dry clothes, guzzled power, and heated the cabin. I took it out and built a cabinet where it stood. Now we air dry the laundry and it isn't salt encrusted.

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Palarran

I had a guy tell me that if I wanted to enjoy my boat and stay married, do whatever it takes to keep your wife happy. So we have a washer/dryer and electric toilets. It was a small, small price to pay in order to keep the boat and wife. Don't fight the small stuff.

+1

It's amazing how effective an actual dryer is, at drying clothes, compared to other methods.

[Mike OReilly]

Well ... here's our washing machine. Dryer? That's why g-d put all those lines on a boat for.

True, we're not full-time cruisers yet, but we use the same "machine" at our home. Haven't owned a washer/dryer for nearly a decade now.

It's amazing what you really need .

[SmartMove]

Originally Posted by vtsailguy

I have been thinking about the towels myself. I have have three boys and the clothes are not a problem, but we always seem to have wet towels.

I was going to see if I could look online for a cheap towel sized shamwow type fabric. I have a small one and it dries in minutes.

Yoga Rat makes great microfiber towel. They are not cheap but dry really fast and a full size beach towel folds up very small.

[zeehag]

when i wash my towels on board,i hang em in the rigging and they are dry within an hour--i live in hotvllle with breezes ... is kinda the way of this latitude..number 17.

is funny how they took longer to dry when i used a dryer on land than they do in these breezes....

[svHyLyte]

Originally Posted by zeehag

... is funny how they took longer to dry when i used a dryer on land than they do in these breezes....

Think raising the heated air to 100% humidity at the selected drying temperature verses air exchanges in the dryer verses air exchanges on deck, eh?

[zeehag]

Originally Posted by svHyLyte

Think raising the heated air to 100% humidity at the selected drying temperature verses air exchanges in the dryer verses air exchanges on deck, eh?

have yet to try to dry clothing in the rain...our humidity here at lat 17 so far is 63-78 percent. dries towels awesome good. even well, for those grammar police present.....

[Kenomac]

Tell her not to worry; we hang clothes out all the time. No salt.

[svHyLyte]

Originally Posted by zeehag

have yet to try to dry clothing in the rain...our humidity here at lat 17 so far is 63-78 percent. dries towels awesome good. even well, for those grammar police present.....

Here in southwest Florida, we do not use towels much for drying off after swimming. Instead we use a couple of synthetic drying chamois that we hang in the cockpit until needed. One can dry off with these quite quickly, wring them out easily, and with a bucket of fresh water in the cockpit, a few dunks allows one to rise the salt out of them and remove salt from a swimmers skin. One can fold them in half and sit on them to pull moisture out of a bathing suit reasonably well. The chamois seem to dry quite quickly hanging in the cockpit, even in relatively higher humidity.

A synthetic drying chamois is also good for initial drying after taking a shower, followed of course, with a real towel although these become much less damp than they would absent the chamois.

On Laundry Day, we hang T-shirts and shorts from the life lines although we add a length of messenger line through sleeves and legs of shorts, with either end tied to the lifelines, to ensure that if the clothes pins let go in a strong wind, the garments don't go adrift. (Underwear and my wife's unmentionables, which she does not like hanging in view, are hung in the forward head and seem to dry quite quickly, even in the relatively high humidity of a southwest Florida summer.) Our beach towels are all Navy Blue as dark towels absorb the sunlight and dry more quickly than do light coloured towels and when they are thrown over the sail cover, are relatively obscure so that we don't look like we're from lower slobovia.

FWIW...