crafty pat

I wash mine in warm water, never thought to use hot. I have had shrinkage and bleeding in warm so I feel that is enough. I won't wash a quilt in hot water either.

Pennyhal

I prewash my fabric to get rid of any bleeders. If it is a quilt I am giving away, I also wash it after it is done in hot water/heavy cycle. I want to know that the quilt will stand up to heavy treatment and survive poor treatment. Had a friend who gave a quilt away and it fell apart when it was put in the washer. I don't think it was particularly well made to begin with, but it can happen.

Onebyone

I don't think I've washed anything in cold water in years. I wash in hot and rinse in warm. But the warm is just lukewarm in my machine. I was shopping at Sears and looked at the washers. No agitators in any of them. The employee said there may be some online but none are being shipped to stores anymore. He said he has sold a lot of commercial washers to farmers and people who get their clothes dirty on their jobs. The average household does not have filthy clothes to wash every day.

MargeD

I do belong to the prewash fabric segment of quilters, however, I've never prewashed fabric in hot water. I never wash anything in my laundry with hot water, warm maybe; but I prewash the fabric in the water temp that I would recommend washing the finished quilt.

Bibliogirl

I wash my fabrics that I suspect will shrink. Sometimes when I am making a pattern that I designed I buy different charm packs. I find that some of the charms will shrink and others don't, so I want to find that out before I assemble a block.

Bibliogirl

I should add to my other comment that when I say "wash", I really mean soak. I never agitate fabric when in the wash machine because it may ravel really badly. It is pretty much a hands-on project.

gale

I wash finished quilts in hot water all the time. I wash pretty much everything in hot water. Except our delicates (mostly my 18 yo daughter has delicates-the rest of us wear jeans and tshirts. lol)

gale

Our washer has an agitator. It's a Speed Queen. We couldn't find many with agitators when we were shopping-they were all special order. We bought our Speed Queen at a small appliance shop. My husband is a farmer, btw-I don't think a washer that uses a small amount of water would even make a dent in his dirt. lol

Caroline94535

They don't know my household, LOL.

I'm looking for a refurbished washing machine/monster from he '60s-'70s. Remember the baskets that fit on the top of the agitator; water was pumped from the washer through the filter to remove all the lint and "bits."

They got the clothes clean!

weezie

Some trivia for you: After using a wringer washer for decades, my mother 'upgraded' to a 'modern' washer & dryer ... this too was many decades ago, when they all had agitators as far as I know; anyway, she said it never got the clothes clean enough so she went back to using her wringer washer and probably back to hanging her clothes on the clothesline, just as she had done for more than a half-century.