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bleach/vinegar question


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Okay, so I may have made a mistake...I was trying to clean up a used dishwasher and cleaned around the edges of the inside with a bleach-based household cleaner. I wiped it up but I know that some of it ran down inside the machine and I didn't bother to wipe it up. Immediately afterward, I put a cupful of vinegar in the machine and started a cycle, because I read vinegar would help freshen up the machine. Only after this did it occur to me that bleach and vinegar mixed can create toxic fumes. Should I be concerned, or is the amount of bleach so small and it is going to be so diluted in the dishwasher that I don't need to worry?

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I may be wrong but I thought bleach was a base and vinegar an acid so they canceled each other - sorta.

 

And I know for sure that it's bleach and ammonia that one must never ever mix.

Yep. Vinegar neutralizes bleach. I remember from when we had a home business putting photos on T-Shirts (back before you could get transfer paper for any printer) researching how to put an image on a black T-shirt. What you had to do was put the front in a square basin of bleach until it was light enough to take an image, then put it in vinegar to neutralize the bleach and stop it from bleaching further. (We never tried it.)

 

So, you neutralized any germ killing capability of the bleach, but probably didn't create toxic fumes.

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Chlorine and ammonia is toxic when mixed. So don't pee in the pool! :lol:

 

Yep. This is what makes pools smell so bad. Have you ever noticed that college pools (that don't allow kids) smell just fine?

 

OTOH, I have taken to pouring bleach on the kitty accidents. There's a lovely exothermic reaction and it feels far more effective than Nature's Miracle (which certainly didn't deter them from a repeat performance!) but it is noxious. I could have a problem with this now that the windows are closed. :tongue_smilie:

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