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Can you do partial batches? I have everything. Except the borax and washing soda are partially used. How much of each would I use?

I KNEW I found a recipe with Epsom Salt! Think I could find it when I was making the detergent? ((Nope!!)) So what I made was 1C Washing Soda, 1C Borax and about 1/2 C lemishine. Do you think I could add some Epsom Salt to this mixture?

I cut a piece of lemon and throw it in the bottom of my dishwasher. The lemon lasts for after a couple of weeks, and I just pull out the old lemon piece and add a new one. We have the hardest water here. It works great. So I am going to try the dry recipe with the piece of lemon. Thanks for the great tips!!

I just made this and the lemon juice turned it yellow. Did this happen to anyone else? I'm about to put it in the back of my car now for it to dry out.

I've made this before, but I made my dishes really cloudy and left a film on them. This doesn't happen with store bought. Any ideas as to what I did wrong?

Can hot water be added to this so the borax melts and then blendered to make a liquid dish soap?

Re: Article: Homemade Dishwasher pellets

Originally Posted by heather310

I AGREE both times I have used this now I have had the hard film all over. And then I really have to scrub it to get it off. Any times?

Ok I am new here and have not tried this yet but plan to very soon. I do however live in Southeastern Arizona now and have been through more than you would ever want to hear about trying to get clean dishes from my dishwasher. Being from Southern Kentucky originally and always having what is apparently perfect well water all my life I had no idea water could be as bad as it is here. The water here has everything you can imagine in it and is very alkaline. When I bought this house 8 years ago I immediately replaced the diswasher with the best model I could find thinking that ust be the problem with the dishes looking like they had been dusted with chalk. Well, the dishwasher wasn't the problem! It is the water. The house even had a water softner system which you would think didn't work at all. I gave up and hand washed the dishes for 8 years until recently installing one of the Nuvo H20 systems. It helped the water overall, but did not help my diswasher problems. I tried all of the settings...no heat...etc. The dishes still looked horrible. The glasses were literally completely frosted. You could not even begin to scrub this stuff off. Being stubborn I kept trying to scrub this stuff off and sticking them back into the diswaher and the majority of them kept improving, but one glass kept getting worse. Finally I discovered that this one glass is apparently some sort of mineral magnet due to the buildup already on it. I leave this sacrificial glass in the dishwasher with every load now and all of my dishes come out great!!

Maybe worth a try if you have this problem. I have tried everything else. Every detergent and rinse aid on the market and every combination of the two products. I have also cleaned the dishwasher with everything available and all of the money saving techniques such as vinegar.

Nothing worked until I happened upon the discovery of the sacrificial glass. Just an old mason jar mug with a hadle which was repurposed as it originally contained jelly I had purchased from the grocery.

Re: Article: Homemade Dishwasher pellets

Originally Posted by amandabuczko

I just tried this today, and it left a hard film all over all my dishes!! http://www.budget101.com/images/smilies/ohthedrama.gif

Has anyone else had this problem? What can I do about it? I made a whole batch of the powder, and I hate to waste it all.

Yeah mine too!! I came here hoping to find a cure! lol.