Detergent Lab

Science 9- Block C                                                                                                 September 10th, 2013

Do expensive detergents clean better than cheaper varieties?

Purpose: To find out if expensive detergents clean better than cheaper varieties.

Hypothesis: I predict that Tide will clean the stain better than the rest of the detergents.

Apparatus and Materials: cloth, ketchup, Tide, Woolite, Western Family detergent, Sunlight, eye dropper, beaker, water

Procedure:

1. Cut cloth into 5 strips and stain cloth with ketchup, let it sit over night

2. Measure out 10 drops of each detergent in 200ml of water and mix with room temperature water

3. Wash cloth for 3 minutes

4. Let cloth dry completely

5. Record your results with pictures

Observations and Results:

(in order from cleanest to dirtiest)

Tide: Cleaned the cloth very well, it left only the slightest sign that the stain was there. Tide cleaned the ketchup stain better than the rest of the detergents.

Sunlight: Sunlight also cleaned the cloth very well, but there are a few more traces of ketchup left compared to the one cleaned with Tide.

Western Family: The Western Family detergent did not clean nearly as well as Tide and Sunlight. It is obvious the stain is still there, but it is faded.

Woolite: This detergent did not clean out the stain easily, making it the worst detergent out of the four. It did clean the stain a little bit, but it is more noticeably stained than the rest.

Water: Surprisingly, water cleaned just about as well as the Woolite. It took out a some of the stain, but it is still not very clean.

Before

  

After
Water, Tide, Western Family, Sunlight, Woolite

Conclusions: To conclude, my hypothesis was supported. Tide cleaned the best out of the four detergents, it left very little evidence that there was a ketchup stain on the cloth. Tide is more expensive than some other brands, but it cleaned the best. Although Woolite was the most expensive out of all the brands we used, it cleaned the least well out of the four. Which makes it not true that more expensive detergents clean better than cheaper varieties.