Introduction
When you’re in a rush and want to save those precious extra minutes, you make mistakes. Some mistakes may cost you more time than you saved while others will cost you money. That’s why you shouldn’t throw everything in the dryer. If things go awfully wrong, you may break the appliance and search frantically for “dryer repair near me” on the internet. Let’s check out things you shouldn’t run through your dryer:
The Items
- Activewear or sportswear – Throwing your activewear in the dryer wouldn’t lead to a dryer breakdown, but all sorts of other troubles. Activewear is coated with special material for sun protection and quick sweat-wicking. However, that coat doesn’t take kindly to the high heat and friction inside a dryer. After just one cycle of machine dryer, you may completely damage the coat or the fabric. Your sportswear loses its elastic property and becomes more susceptible to tears and holes during intense physical activities like running or workouts. That’s why you should always dry activewear on a rack. Machine washing can damage them and hanging them dry may distort their shape.
- Fabrics with flammable stains – Within four years since the turn of the last decade, US fire departments responded to over 16000 cases of dryer and washing machine fires with the former making up the majority of the share. That’s why it’s important to be careful about anything you put inside the dryer. Check your sheets and clothing thoroughly for oil and gas residues before throwing them in the dryer. If there is any flammable residue it won’t just lead to loss of property but can be a risk to the lives of you and your family.
- Dryer sheets – Their name makes it unintuitive for them to be on this list. While they won’t damage your dryer, they can cause some health problems. They aren’t good for your skin, your respiratory system, or the environment. Using them consistently for every dryer load may cause long-term health problems. Instead, you can swap them out with eco-friendly materials like scented wool balls.
- Beachwear and sandy towels – Sitting by the beach on the warm sand and watching the sunset is a favorite American pastime. However, you don’t want that sand to end up in your dryer. Sand and other small debris can easily get stuck in the drum gaps and creates a horrible noise when it spins. Moreover, those sand particles wear down the components over time and increase your maintenance costs.
- Lingerie – If you’re one of the unfortunate ones to throw your lingerie in the dryer, you know what happens. It can reduce the lifespan of your lingerie by a significant measure and destroy that expensive piece of innerwear. You shouldn’t put anything expensive inside the dryer. Intense heat inside the dryer can damage the laces, latex, and other fabrics. Moreover, they don’t feel the same and can become quite uncomfortable if things go really bad. That’s why it’s best to lint dry bras and underwear in a lingerie bag.
- Anything with fur – Furry friends give you a lot of proverbial and literal love by making a hairy mess along their path. While pet fur can be in any place of your home, it should never be in the dryer. If pet fur builds up in the dryer after a few cycles, and you forget to clean the lint screen, you may end up with a fire hazard that can be triggered at any time. Even if your dryer doesn’t catch on fire, the blocked lint screen would reduce the efficiency and drying capability of the appliance dramatically. Even after multiple cycles, you may not have dry socks and pay an insane price on your energy bill. That’s why it’s important to keep your dryer free from pet hair and clean the filters within the right maintenance period.
- Spandex – As mentioned above, the high temperature inside the dryer can ruin the elasticity of fabrics and spandex certainly makes the cut. Spandex yoga pants and leggings can be very expensive and due to the dryer heat, they may shrink or shrivel up. You may get distortions at the waist, opening, or other places and in the worst cases, it will shrink enough to not fit you anymore. That’s why you should air dry them on a clothesline or use air drying cycles in the dryer with the heat turned off.
- Lace – Lace is another delicate fabric that doesn’t belong in the dryer. In fact, you should even skip the washing machine for cleaning lace. It’s best to hand wash them and let them dry flat on a mesh surface so that they don’t lose their shape.
- Bags and backpacks – Your backpacks and bags hold a lot of things and that’s why they need a good cleaning once in a while. However, you should never put them in the dryer. Bags and backpacks are made of various kinds of materials. You don’t want to risk sparks from the high heat and friction inside the dryer. Moreover, dryers can also destroy the protective layers and coats on your backpack. You can throw reusable bags in the dryer only if they are made from 100 percent cotton.
- Sweaters – Sweaters and other knitted garments should come with a big warning label instead of a small one attached near the waist or collar. These kinds of fabrics lose their shape and throwing them inside the dryer after that is like adding salt to the open wound. Knitted fabric both natural and man-made, can get stretched or shrink inside the dryer, and it’s almost impossible to restore its shape. Always keep knitted fabrics out of dryers.
Conclusion
By now you know what things should be kept out of your dryer. For the above-mentioned items, it’s best to dry them without the use of technology, the old-fashioned way. If you mess up, you can always get your dryer repaired by a professional by searching for “dryer repair near me”.
