Washing Machine Help Forum

What is the Cotton Eco cycle for?

Thanks

Hi dach,

It reduces the water and energy use for that program, IIRC it reduces the rinses to achieve a lot of the water saving.

HTH

K.

Mine still does the three rinses on this cycle. The manual says that it uses a short main wash rather than a long which it only uses on the white and heavy cotton washes.
Think the main advantage is that it is half an hour shorter so uses a bit less electricity.
All on page 12 of the manual

For some reason on this wash cycle the time remaining on mine has been underestimated by 20 mins ish. It gets to 1min remaining at the end of the first rinse where it stays for 5 mins or so into the second rinse even though the progress lights around the dial seem to be accurate. At this point it adds 17 mins.

Was going to ask a question about this but tonight it seemed to sort itself out and put on the correct estimate of 1h 34 mins instead of 1h 5 mins

Yes, we've also seen some inconsistent 'time left' displays. My wife is keeping a note of them. Its not a major problem - just a minor inconvenience.

Guys - is there any obvious reason for this?

Yes there is an obvious reason/s for this.

What happens with all machine that have a countdown timer is that the time is altered depending on the fill pressure, load size, distribution and water temperature.

What you see at the start is the optimum if all those conditions are correct.

Most machines (not all but I know ISE10 does it) is to recalculate on-the-fly as it determines the various conditions at points within the program. So, for example, if more water is needed for a larger load then it fill more, which takes longer, has to heat more water, which takes longer... and so on. And, obviously, things like having to redistribute for spin, cannot be calculated until the rinses are complete.

By watching the countdown live and noting the changes what you are in effect seeing is the machine recalculate on a load-by-load basis and they will often not be the same. In fact, I suspect that no two loads would be exactly the same.

It's not inconsistent as such, it's based on a number of variables calculated in real time with the machine compensating for anything that it determines is or could be a problem for it. There's several reasons for this but it's primarily to protect the machine and the clothing.

To put it into a simplistic analogy think of it this way, I can use Autoroute to calculate a route from London to Manchester and it tells me that it will take 3 hours or whatever. What it can't foresee is road works, accidents, go-slows and traffic along the way, therefore the initial "estimated" journey time may well not equal the actual traveling time. But, under optimal conditions, the initial estimate is probably pretty much spot on.

HTH

K.

That explains it then - thanks.

If I was to be really, really pedantic then.... if the machine recalculates 'on the fly' as it were...apart from the fact that it does tell you the latest 'time to complete'...would it be fair to say that the time at the beginning of the cycle is a rough estimate but getting closer & closer to reality as the cycle nears completion?

Yes, exactly, the time given at the start is what the machine estimates that the program will take to complete based on an optimum load size, incoming water pressure and water temperature.

As it determines those variables it will "re-assess" itself and present a new ETA to program completion.

Still more annoying are those that give an ETA then just ignore it, continuing on past the estimated stop time.

K.

kwatt wrote: But, under optimal conditions, the initial estimate is probably pretty much spot on.

Hmm. I have seen the small variations on other programs but I think there was more to it on my eco white wash i.e. the last one started at 1h 5mins but actually took about 1h 35 ish. All the other programs seem to start with a spot on estimate. Bit weird that it kept getting to one minute remaining during the first rinse cycle.

As I said when I switch the dial now it has started to put up the correct estimate so I'll just keep an eye on it and report back if it changes.

I wonder...could it be that it 'remembers' your loads & times & therefore can now gve you a more accurate estimate from the start?

Or is this a flight of fancy?

No, it recalculates on each load.

Even the absorbency of the clothes has an effect remember.

K.

I've realised the large variations in time on some of my washes were caused by me interupting the program to add some more clothes.
Time has been pretty much spot on otherwise.

Well that's one variable i hadn't thought of !


John