The Laundry Pod is Both a Washing Machine and Arm Workout

Environmentalists are going to love this one. The Laundry Pod is a hand-cranked clothes washer that looks like a big salad spinner, but it actually functions much like a traditional washing machine—sans the electricity.

It's been around for a few years, but it still seems to have the market cornered—there aren't many other salad spinning, zero-electricity clothes washers out there. Although, the pedal-powered GiraDora is certainly a contender.

Here’s how the Laundry Pod works: Dirty clothes are placed in the device’s inner basket. Then, a mere 1 – 1.5 gallons of water are poured over the load, plus a standard pour of detergent. After a brief soak, the user churns the basket with a small handle for about a minute. A hose then drains the dirty water into a sink, basin, or washtub. After the drain is completed, the user adds another gallon or so of clean water and rinses the load until the draining completes and the clothes are ready for drying.

All in all, when it's done, you’ve spent zero electricity, about 3 gallons of water—compared to the 40 or so used by most washing machines—and even gotten a five minute arm-and-shoulder workout. Most people would call this a win-win, but you’d be surprised by some of the Amazon reviews that outright pan the Laundry Pod, and for some questionable reasons.

Here are two of them:

• “If you are NOT physically fit forget it, it will not work and you can not use it. I found it gave me quite a work out with my arms and shoulders. In fact I found I had pain in my neck and shoulders the next day after I used it.”

• “Once you're spinning for 1 minute, you just want to stop, because the arm gets really tired. Even with small items the arm gets tired because you have to spin at least 5 minutes one way, and 5 the other (if you want the clothes to be cleaned).”

To be fair, this product is not ideal for the elderly or folks with disabilities, and a lot of the negative reviews had to do with the Laundry Pod’s apparently shoddy build, but the exercise aspect should not be reason enough to trash the thing. And the concept alone suggests superior designs could be made. It’s kind of funny that a new non-electric, manually operated clothes washing device is seen as some sort of exercise machine.

But given the capacity and design limitations, we imagine something like the Laundry Pod would work great for camping, road trips, and other extended leaves from domestic washing machines—not so much routine washing. And you can’t beat the efficiency.

For a mere $90 on Amazon you can try one out yourself.

[Via: Daily Mail]