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65 of 67 found the following review helpful:
 FIELD TESTED IN AFGHANISTAN Sep 28, 2010
By Dave Jones
"Dave"
My son is fighting at a tiny combat outpost in Afghanistan. They have no washers, no amenities. I ordered this and had it directly shipped to my son. He called me and told me it works very well!
He said you put your water, soap clothes in bucket of water. You plunge up and down which causes a suction in the water. The water actually is sucked through the clothing and removes dirt. He emptied his bucket of water and soap and repeated until the water stayed clean. Then he poured rinse water in the buck and repeated to remove soap. All the guys at the outpost are actually excited over this litter device! No more soiled, stinking clothes!
44 of 45 found the following review helpful:
Good back to basics option May 01, 2011
By Spirit of 76
This item is actually the Breathing Mobile Washer, not the Rapid Washer that GetPreparedStuff misidentifies it as. The Rapid Washer is the original 19th century design made out of tinned steel, not plastic. That's heavier, prone to rusting and can damage clothes with its sharp edges.
I was looking for an inexpensive clothes washer because I was sick and tired of hauling clothes to the laundromat, and being in an apartment, I didn't have room for a washer and dryer. Electric or manual really didn't matter. What did matter was that hooking up to the faucet would be extremely difficult if not impossible since I already had a Clear2O filter connection on it. That ruled out things like the small Haier washers, which were too expensive as well. The electric Wonder Washer looked like an option, but had some bad reviews for its low capacity, sometimes poor reliability, noise and what looked like rather weak agitator action. It just swirled clothes around for a few seconds each way, not back and forth like a regular top-load washer. Think of an oversize stand blender. I considered the Wonderwash hand-powered washer, which received good reviews for its cleaning, but that seemed like it was rather tedious, with screwing and unscrewing the lid and installing and removing the drain tube and watching water drain in a thin stream. I settled on the Breathing Mobile Washer, which as a bonus was the least expensive option of all. (Just buy it direct from the manufacturer's website as mentioned in other reviews. Better to support the manufacturer and save yourself a little or a lot of money by cutting out the middleman. Don't mind their website. It's rather badly designed, but you're only going there to order.)
In my experience, the Breathing Washer works pretty well. For really dirty laundry, just pre-soak the clothing by pushing it down into the water/detergent with the Breathing Washer (15 seconds of agitation should do it) then let it sit for 15-30 minutes before doing the regular agitation cycle. A minute or two of agitation really does do the job. Again, really bad loads may need extra rinse cycles, but unlike a regular washing machine, you can repeat fill-agitate-empty rinse cycles until you can see the water is clear, rather than trusting the machine. It's quick enough that I don't really mind doing laundry now, instead of wasting over an hour at the laundromat. The plunging action is surprisingly easy. No strain at all. At the end of two minutes, I'm not winded, thanks to the action using two arms rather than one. Users of the Wonderwash have complained of having a tired arm after two minutes of cranking. But who couldn't do with a little bit of exercise? I've done several consecutive loads without getting tired. It's quiet enough that I can do laundry late at night without disturbing my neighbors. All you hear is a little sloshing and the "breathing" noise as the air rushes through the small top vents.
Because it's so adjustable in terms of the amount of water and clothing, it's great if you need to do some "emergency" laundry, like if you need a certain garment clean for tomorrow or if you spilled something on your favorite shirt. No need to wait for a full load for the washing machine.
In terms of reliability, this is as simple as it can get. No moving parts at all. The blue parts appear to be made of heavy gauge polypropylene almost 1/8" thick. I can't imagine this ever breaking short of being run over by a truck. There are some reports of the Wonderwash having problems with its construction, which is one reason I decided against that. The only other thing you need is a bucket, and buckets also last pretty much forever. The square plastic buckets that 22 pound clumping cat litter comes in are a good fit, just a little wider than the 8" diameter of the blue cone.
A couple of tips: The first thing I would recommend is replacing the handle if you intend to use it on the floor. Your local hardware store or home center should have longer screw-in broom handles. I got a 4-1/2 foot tubular steel handle from Lowe's for $5, which should last the rest of my life. The longer handle lets you stand upright and close to the bucket rather than having to stoop down. This eliminates stress on your lower back. With the longer handle, the power comes from your arms, not your back. Or put the bucket on a platform to raise it up if you want to use the included handle. The first few loads I did without the longer handle, I just put the bucket on my bathtub rim, which also made it quick and convenient to fill with water and dump out when I'm done. The bucket can't fall off the rim. If it slides toward me, my legs stop it from falling. If it tilts away, the handle of the Breathing Washer gives me enough leverage to easily pull it back. In fact, even with the longer handle, I prefer to work inside the tub, so any splashing is contained. I can also wash larger items directly in the tub thanks to the longer handle.
Also, other users have complained that the handle loosens during use. I haven't had that problem. Just screw it on tightly the first time. Grip the "strainer" part, not the cone, when tightening. That's the part that's actually screwing into the handle, after all. Hold the cone and it'll just spin around the handle before it fully tightens. If you do have trouble with loosening, try winding a layer or two of Teflon tape around the threads before assembly (an old plumber's technique to keep threads from loosening; pick it up at the hardware store when you buy the longer handle), or smear some toothpaste on the threads before screwing the handle in, then let it harden for a few days before using again. This acts as a threadlock compound. (Ever notice how hard it is to clean dried-on toothpaste off the sink? Or how tough it is to re-open a tube of toothpaste after the cap gets dried on?) This last may make it harder to unscrew if you ever need to disassemble it, but the Breathing Washer doesn't take up much space, so I don't expect to ever have to anyway.
Paired with a drying rack, I now have a very "green" (economical and environmentally sound) laundry setup that costs me only pennies a week in detergent to run. I know I'm wasting less water and putting less phosphorus from detergent into the waste stream. Less phosphorus means fewer toxic blooms in bodies of water near sewage treatment plants. And finally for those of you who care about this, the Breathing Mobile Washer is made in the USA (Idaho, to be precise) unlike the Wonderwash and Wonder Washer (and nearly every regular washing machine), which are imports.
36 of 37 found the following review helpful:
 better than a washboard Jul 19, 2010
By Justin Hale
I have purchased a washboard and this item. I have done two loads with this device. It is as fast as stated earlier. After a few seconds the water turns brown or gray. After a few minutes the clothes are clean enough to rinse. I have washed jeans, artificial materials, towels, and delicate shirts. All are handled gently while still getting them clean. The suction and expulsion action must be the way to go, apparently. I just fill up my bath tub and plunge in.
The plastic is actually very thick, which pleasantly surprised me. The metal that connects to the wooden handle wiggles slightly and the plastic needs to be tightened once or twice throughout the wash, but other than that it works better than I imagined. For the price it can be beat. I wouldn't use a mechanical washer after trying this.
Unless you have a way to plunge close to your body it will give your arms and back a good work out in that short time. Also keep in mind that although hand washing is simple easy and cheap hand wringing is time consuming, distorts cloths, and often leaves cloths dripping still. This goes double for jeans. A spin dryer may be a good idea. I just tried a mop bucket ringer and it fails to outperform hand wringing in any way, especially for items with buttons and such.
38 of 40 found the following review helpful:
GREAT PRODUCT! May 01, 2010
By Adam Kadmon
I have to admit I was a bit skeptical when I saw the breathing mobile
washer but I wanted to get something just in case of a power outage or
any other kind of problems where I would not have access to a washing
machine and or power. I saw another hand powered unit called the
Wonder Washer but people said they were made cheaply and broke easily,
you product looks simple and VERY durable.
I washed some kitchen rags that were getting smelly. My machine
usually gets them pretty clean, but they still have a residual smells that are hard to get out like onion and garlic.
After using the breathing mobile washer for just 3 minutes the smells
came right out! I was impressed to say the least, not only at the
effectiveness but the speed at which it was able to clean. This is the cleanest I have ever seen some of my old kitchen rags.
This device is based on a VERY popular old washer called the rapid washer. The designed has been around for a while and this designed has with stood the test of time in both simplicity and effectiveness.
GET THIS PRODUCT, IT WORKS!!
37 of 39 found the following review helpful:
 awesome product, too bad you're getting ripped off on here Jan 11, 2011
By dan shuckhart
I'm currently stationed at an oupost in afghanistan. This product is definetly worth its weight in gold over here. The only problem I've found is that to purchase it off of amazon cost 31.25 with shipping, while you can order it directly from breathingwasher.com for 19.00 with shipping. Also it arrived in a busted usps box. Luckily nothing was broken on it. You would b way better off to just go directly to their site, which is where i will be ordering my next one from.
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