Healthcare Laundry: Charles Loelius, Cleantex, Irvington, N.J.
While I can see some benefit to post-sorting soiled linen, particularly when space is limited, I have never resorted to it for a variety of reasons.
First, post-sorting requires that the linen be washed on the strongest possible formula. For instance, in a healthcare plant, you would need to wash all items on a pad formula. This would result in more time, energy, water, mechanical action and chemicals than would otherwise be necessary. The 30% more chlorine or peroxide required for cleaning would result in some loss of tensile strength.
Secondly, you would need to dry everything on the longest dry time, which would use more energy and shorten the life of the linen.
In a modern plant with overhead rail storage, unless you were prepared to post-sort at every clean station, post-sorting makes no sense whatsoever. Post-sorting in this environment would also negatively impact production planning, as you would have no idea how much of any particular item you had either to wash or finish.
Pre-sorting soil, aside from the obvious laundering benefits, results in the removal of unwanted items, particularly trash, plastic and needles, which can damage the equipment and, in the case of needles, injure workers.
Even a partial post-sort, such as sheets and pillowcases separated from dry-fold items, would mitigate some of the drawbacks previously mentioned, but not enough, in my opinion, to institute such a program.
In a nutshell, I would say that unless you have no space whatsoever to do so, post-sorting provides much fewer benefits and many more drawbacks than pre-sorting.
Textiles: Steve Kallenbach, ADI American Dawn, Los Angeles, Calif.
As a general practice, our industry as a whole mixes table linens by “color grouping” for the purpose of washing “like product” on the same chemical formula.
To accomplish this, pre-sorting occurs to group the product into like colors. Once washed, post-sorting occurs to finish and pack the goods into their singular colors. This mixed process is much more cost-efficient than complete pre-sorting would be.
Here are the suggested color groupings for washing mixed linens:
- Color Group 1 — White (always by itself due to the amount of bleach needed)
- Color Group 2 — Includes Beige, Bermuda Sand, Ivory, Maize, etc.
- Color Group 3 — Includes Gray, Olive, Seafoam Green, Wedgewood Blue, etc.
- Color Group 4 — Includes Gold, Peach, Pink, Sandalwood
- Color Group 5 — Includes Bronze, Burnt Orange, Dusty Rose, Orange
- Color Group 6 — Includes Forest Green, Kelly Green, Royal Blue, Teal
- Color Group 7 — Includes Black, Charcoal, Chocolate, Burgundy, Maroon, Navy, Pecan, Red, Rust
Each of these color groups has a slightly different chemistry in the wash formula. Whites call for a good amount of bleach. Although bleaching is not recommended for any color, it is typically used in Color Group 2, mostly to accomplish the removal of mildew.
As to the loss of tensile strength, both bleach and alkali contribute. The lighter the product, the more bleach, detergent, time and temperature is used, which all depletes tensile strength.
So, our industry has come to a balance in this area, by mixed “like” colors, to fill the wash wheel for maximum efficiency.
There may, however, be other reasons or needs to pre-sort. If an operation has very large amounts of a specific color, it might be worthwhile. Additionally, if an operation has low inventories and quick turns on specific colors, this might also be a reason to pre-sort that specific.
A good manufacturing source for information on soil sorting can be found on USA Milliken’s website, on its wash color PDF. This color grouping information would apply whether it’s USA Milliken product or imported linen goods.
In the area of bed linens (a completely different business), pre-sorting is almost always done for the purpose of preparing the product for efficiency in the finishing (ironing) process. Additionally, in bed linens, the type of soil can dictate the sort needed in order to use the right wash formula to achieve clean, unstained linens.
For any operator, it is recommended that you look into this area annually to make sure that color sorts have not migrated to a point that certain colors are being mixed incorrectly and washed on the wrong formula, creating tensile strength loss.
Once mix-ups like this occur in an operation, it can become standard practice. As they say, “Inspect what you expect.” Happy laundering!
Equipment Manufacturing: Tony Jackson, Kannegiesser ETECH, Grand Prairie, Texas
I see the post-sort scenario quite often in healthcare operations in both European and Canadian laundries. As an equipment company, we have customers processing in both post- and pre-sort methods. There are pros and cons with both methods, and I will attempt to cover some important aspects of each.
The customers doing post-sort mostly use this method due to either local governmental regulations or for the safety of their employees in the soil-sort area. With post-sorting, there is far less chance of biohazard material affecting the staff, and the opportunity for injury to operators by foreign objects (sharps) is mostly avoided in this area prior to washing.
On the other hand, post-sort also creates some added washroom challenges for the equipment and overall linen life. The Panel question seems to be true that this could do some damage to the linens over time.
With post-sort, the wash formula is typically set to clean and sanitize the heaviest soil classification. The chemistry has to be dosed higher (per pound of goods) for the entire load, even though some items would normally take less to achieve hygienically clean status. With this higher-soil wash formula programmed across the full batch, this could create additional chemistry, wash time and possibly increased temperature on the light-soil classification items.
After numerous washings on the items, this added chemistry, wear, etc., can break down the fabric prematurely on the light-soiled items, increasing the chances for linen loss.
In addition to the linen damage, the equipment can also be affected, with hospital instruments and sharps not being sorted prior to entering the wash phase. We have seen scalpels and other items puncture press membranes.
Additionally, there have been instances where the foreign objects get lodged in a wash cylinder (perforation holes) and then do physical damage to all linen items being processed. If these sharps then tumble together with the linen in the mechanical-action process or dry cycle, it tends to lessen linen life substantially.
Finally, if post-sorting after the washing/extracting process, one still has to physically sort the damp items by classification. Due to the moisture in the items, the actual labor extended is greater, as the damp items tend to cling together and are heavier to pick up and pull apart. This could have an adverse effect on overall productivity during a complete shift.
From all I have seen in our industry, the predominant method of processing is pre-sorting, so one would be led to accept the fact that when all factors are considered, it is the way to go.
Consulting Services: Jon Witschy, Spindle, Woodridge, Ill.
There could be a case that post-sorting allows for more damage, since you are not able to control the chemical dosing as fine like you can with pre-sort. By separating cottons, blends and polyester, you can better regulate the dosing to prevent damage.
For example, caustic could strengthen cotton fibers, but too much would damage polyester fibers; a mixed load prevents good application of chemistry to provide maximum product life.
Also, chemicals such as sour and bleach might not be rinsed effectively because of the fabric mix, and this could lead to damage in the dryers.
Concerns about pre-sort and post-sort go beyond chemical usage. For example, with batches of mixed towels and sheets, it would be difficult to dry goods and process them on the clean side with any consistency. In this case, pre-sorting improves quality and makes you much more efficient on the back end.
With that said, there are certainly situations where post-sort could work.
In a food-and-beverage plant, you could wash spun napkins with spun table tops and have very few issues, other than the time to post-sort, which in theory is the same to pre-sort. Assuming the restaurant linens being processed are all white or all color, this would be fine.
The answer to this question needs to be centered on each individual process. If done in hospitality/healthcare and stripping a bed, you should definitely pre-sort. In other industries, like the preceding food-and-beverage example, you could consider post-sort.
With industrial goods, sorting may not be a major concern at all, because the customer usually sorts in bins, so garments and items like shop towels hopefully wouldn’t get mixed.
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