Review: The Wonder Wash & Spin Dryer by Laundry Alternative

If you’re off-grid, living on the road or just trying to go green in as many ways as possible, you’ve probably grappled with the best ways to do your laundry without slaving over it for hours on end. Getting clothes and household linens thoroughly clean and dry while using as little water and energy as possible is challenging, to say the least – but two products from Laundry Alternative can help make your life a little easier and your laundry routine a whole lot greener.

The Wonder Wash is a compact, portable hand-powered washing machine that doesn’t even have to be hooked up to a sink. Here’s what the company had to say about it:

• Washes a 5-lb. load super clean in just a couple of minutes.
• Has a patented pressure system that forces detergent into the fabric at high speed for a fast, efficient, economic and very easy wash
• Is ideal for campers, single persons and even for the housewife with small frequent loads like hand washables and diapers.
• Is ideal for delicates such as woolens, silks, knitted dresses and cashmere garments.
• Uses far less water than even hand washing.

The Wonder Wash is essentially a plastic bin with a pressure lid, a stand, a handle and a drain spout. You put warm or hot water in the drum, add soap and then put in your laundry. Once the lid is properly in place, the air inside the drum absorbs the heat of the water and expands, creating pressure inside the drum. That pressure forces the detergent through the fabric, reportedly 100 times faster than you could do it by hand or in a conventional washing machine.

The Laundry Alternative website said that it can fit 7-8 dress shirts, 10 t-shirts, 30 pairs of socks or 2-3 pairs of blue jeans. I decided to test this claim and stuffed it with 3 pairs of my husband’s cargo pants, figuring they were the bulkiest items I had on hand and possibly the toughest to clean. They fit in pretty easily, and turning the handle was not exactly a Herculean task. I set the Wonder Wash up next to my kitchen sink and turned the handle for just three minutes. Then I drained it with the attached drain spout, filled it up with more water and spun the handle a few more times to rinse and drained it again. I must admit I was pretty surprised when the pants, which had been pretty nasty from yardwork, came out clean.

Of course, they were also sopping wet. The Wonder Wash doesn’t wring water from fabrics like a conventional washing machine does, so you’re either in for a whole lot of hand-wringing – or you can use the Spin Dryer, made by the same company.

From the Laundry Alternative website:

• Works in only 2-3 minutes
• 12.2 lb capacity for wet laundry, 5.5 lb capacity for dry laundry
• 3200 rpm spin speed
• Portable, only weighs 22 lbs
• Compact, only 13.7″ x 13.7″ x 24″ (lwh)
• Much gentler on clothes than a conventional tumble dryer
• Removes mineral deposits and detergents, rather than baking them on
• Can be used as a standalone dryer, or with a tumble dryer
• If used with a conventional tumble dryer, cuts drying time by 30 minutes or more, significantly reducing energy costs and prolonging the life of your dryer and clothing
• Connects to any 110V outlet, no installation required.

It did, in fact, get the pants even drier than they would normally be coming out of a conventional washing machine, and it only took three minutes. You can then either throw the load into your regular dryer for vastly reduced overall drying time or hang them up to dry (which is obviously the greenest solution).

These products are small enough to fit in your VW bus, tiny ass apartment or wherever you call home. While the size means you can’t do huge loads – forget fitting a comforter into either one – it does make them super portable. I find the size of the Wonder Wash to be just fine for the amount of laundry my husband and I produce (which isn’t much). The Wonder Wash would also be great for parents who’d like to keep their baby’s clothes – or dirty cloth diapers – separate from their own laundry, particularly since it’s so gentle on the clothes.

You can even use the Wonder Wash in your backyard and dump the grey water into your garden afterward (assuming you’re using phosphate-free laundry detergent or none at all, of course).

All in all, these are great products that make it much easier to have an eco-friendly laundry routine that doesn’t require a return to the methods of the 1800’s. Oh yeah, and the prices are super reasonable, too – $42.95 for the Wonder Wash and $134.95 for the Spin Dryer. You’ll make the money back in months with all the water and energy you’ll save.

Link [Wonder Wash] + [Spin Dryer]

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