Flushable Wipes? Keep Your Local Plumber Employed!
Written: May 05 '04 (Updated May 05 '04)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great for quickly wiping hands when away from sink, pleasant sent.
Cons: May clog your sewer pipes, small size can be messy in cleaning a baby poop
The Bottom Line: Better off with the bigger wipes that you toss in the trash.
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| shoehorny's Full Review: Kleenex Cottonelle Flushable Moist Wipes With Aloe |
Review of Kleenex Cottonelle Wipes (May 5, 2004)
My wife gave me one of her beautiful happy smiles one day, several years ago, when our daughter was first potty training. My wife claimed she found a baby wipe that she could flush in the toilet. No more stinky diaper pails or garbage containers to deal with. Just flush the poopy wipe away!
I was skeptical from the first flush. I took a sample wipe back to my workshop for scientific analysis. I filled a bucket with water and put the wipe in the bucket, then left it there. I came back a day later to find the wipe still in tact. I swirled the water around a bit to see if the wipe would fall apart, but it didn’t. I checked it a week later, and it still remained in tact. I immediately enforced a “no-flush” policy for these wipes in our house. Unfortunately, I only applied this policy to our own home.
We own some rental property. Last week, we received a call from one of the tenants. The tenant complained that the sewer backed up into the basement and made a big mess. I called the plumber and he snaked out the pipes. Normally, the charge would have been $140 to snake out the pipes, however, it ended up costing close to $300 since he had to pull out two full-sized garbage bags of these baby wipes from the sewer line. He identified the obstruction as “paper towels”. After hosing one of them off, we noticed the small, rectangular shape and re-identified it as a baby wipe.
I questioned the tenants about this, especially since I thought it was strange that a group of college students, all young men, should have so many baby wipes in their sewer line. The men confessed that they used the wipes to clean their own behinds, because it was softer on their behinds than traditional dry toilet tissue. They have been using them for the past two years that they lived in the house. Imagine that!
On the plus side, these wipes are moist and they are comfortable on our baby’s behind. They are a bit small, so to clean up a big poop, you will need several wipes. They also seem to be wetter than the traditional baby wipes we once used. They do have a fresh scent and come in a convenient, small sized plastic box. The box is rectangular in shape and it is easy to open. My daughter likes to help herself to the wipes and often leaves the box open. If the box is left open and there are only a few wipes left in the box, the wipes tend to dry out. In this case, I simply add a little water to the box and it becomes moist again.
They are also fairly inexpensive and widely available in grocery stores and discount stores. The boxes are light-weight and convenient to tuck away in a diaper bag (unlike some of the competitors’ big bulky boxes). Refills can be purchased for the plastic boxes, usually at cheaper prices. The refills come in sealed bags and require you to transfer the supply to the plastic box. I found the refills tend to be soaking wet. Also, when the wipes are wet, they tend to cling together, so if you are trying to change a baby diaper in a hurry, you might want to get the wipes out a bit in advance, in case quick action is required.
We primarily use the wipes to clean the poop off of our baby’s behind. My wife will sometimes also use the wipes to clean up the baby’s face and hands, if she made a mess. They are particularly handy when on the road in the car and the baby needs to be refreshed. They are also good to clean messy adult hands. They leave skin feeling fresh and smooth. The wipes contain aloe – an additive that leaves skin feeling moist. It also contains a pleasant light scent that is not overpowering.
Overall, I prefer the bigger wipes for cleaning the baby’s poops. These are a bit small in size and I feel I get better results with the bigger wipes. I would recommend not flushing these wipes down the toilet, for reasons stated above. Instead, put them in a pail lined with a plastic bag and toss them in the trash. They do make an excellent hand wipe to clean up when away from a sink and this is this product’s saving grace. Thanks for reading my review!
Mike
Recommended:
No
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shoehorny
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