1.8L universal cleaner refill, atomiser spray bottle and 2 recycled microfibre cloths.
Aldi Special Buys - On Sale 27 January
(Koh $55.90 plus postage)
Koh Surface Cleaner Kit $32.99 @ ALDI
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slipperyslippers on 25/01/2024 - 17:52 aldi.com.au (1495 clicks)
Last edited 25/01/2024 - 18:00 by 1 other user
Last edited 25/01/2024 - 18:00 by 1 other user
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Who would pay this much for surface cleaner?
Its guud shizt
What's so good about it?
People who want something that works better than most other options
People who don't realise it's only water and Potassium Hydroxide (KOH).
You can buy something like this and mix it up and you are good for years.
Potassium and Sodium Hydroxide are for most intents and purposes practically the same thing. Just sprinkle a little drain cleaner into a bottle of water and you’ve got “KOH”.
All the name brand cleaners are like ridiculous amounts more for identical chemicals and no one cares, fancy packaging and marketing and costs more = better product. It is part of the gouging problem, consumers don't do research and take it from these companies.
This is exactly what I do, cheap and simple and last forever. No reason to pay someone else to mix with water and charge another 70% on-top.
What’s the ratio?
Also standing by for an answer to this…
The ratio is about 1:48. 20 grams of KOH to 980 millilitres of water. This will give you about a 2% solution. Also worth noting you should always slowly add the KOH to water, never the other way around. Adding water to KOH can cause a violent reaction (exothermic reaction), because it heats up. You should also use distilled water, not tap water. Definitely wear goggles and gloves, you don't want this stuff in your eyes. It can be corrosive.
@Vheissu: aint nobody got time for that
just methylated spirits or alcohol proylene on everything and hire a cleaner for the mess i make, $33 isnt that far off
@juki: @juki Agreed. You can buy about 2kg of KOH powder for about $20-25, which is cheaper, but you can use methylated spirits or vinegar to clean, which do the same job cleaning wise anyway. I use vinegar mostly and it gets the job done.
@Vheissu: i wont buy any koh, on my days off i'm in no mood for measuring or remembering a correct mixing order
vinegar and baking soda are cheap enough, maybe some gif too
@Vheissu: the ratio on the Koh website is 0.5%. this is 5 grams to about a litre of water.
https://help.koh.com/en-US/what-are-the-ingredients-of-unive…
TV add marketing where people impulse buy, which is(should) NOT applicable for OZB users.
The microfibre cloths are excellent (although down to a 2-pack now, was four until recently (Edit: still is a 4-pack at KOH)) as is the spray bottle.
Also the mop for $40 is excellent value, as is the Universal Cleaner 1.8L for $10.
This is actually a good cleaner with a nice streak free finish.
I've had good experiences with it but the main selling point for me is that it doesn't smell like anything. Sometimes you have to wait a few minutes or do a couple of passes.
yep, tried a few and have come back to koh for very much that reason.
I spray it the surface or whatever and leave it for 10 secs, then go it.
This is what I don't like about, has no smell at all.
Thought I'd add more since there's all this 3rd party views.
The cleaner works as good as any other general purpose cleaner BUT without leaving residue and unnecessary fragrance.
I know it works much better than water because the amount of kid distributed pasta and bog sauce it's helped to clean up and remove any grease on the table is not some water can do alone with wasting a lot more effort and clean cloth.Like everything on the internet YMMV.
I heard it cleans out your wallets and accounts quote well
"IT" being slick marketing and gullible people?
I call bs on this test. It's not a miracle cleaner but it definitely works better than water
I agree. It works better than water but definitely not $33 better.
I will stick to other Aldi branded cleaners or my own mixtures made out of baking powder, vinegar, methanol, cloudy ammonia etc.Once you have cracked the code, it’s hard to spend money on ready to go cleaners.
Doubt you'd be wiping methanol around - highly toxic stuff
@Murpha: I do on glass. Infact I make my own windscreen cleaner with it. No issues for the last ~10 years.
Here, have at it:
Windscreen Cleaner: 3L water, 15ml cloudy ammonia, 30ml methylated spirits, and for the real professional look, 3 drops of blue food colouring. NOT SUITABLE FOR TINTED WINDOWS.@Murpha: if you're referring to methylated spirits, for a long time now methanol in Australia has not had actual methanol in it. it's just ethanol with a bitterant to make it undrinkable.
Wouldn't baking power and vinegar cancel each other out?
Anyone quoting Choice reviews should be completely ignored.
Why. I thought they are pretty good source.
The sprayer looks like Decor oil spray bottle, if it doesn't work well, at least you still get something useful.
https://decor.com.au/products/decor-cook-oil-spray-bottle
Coincidentally, Mr Clean uses a similar sprayer as well.
https://www.mrclean.com/en-us/shop-products/multi-purpose-sp…
Probably very similar to this $5 bottle from Kmart https://www.kmart.com.au/product/300ml-refillable-oil-spray-…
Probably just a generic <$0.50 bottle.
The spray bottle is actually pretty good (they're currently on V2), and absolutely NOTHING like the OIL bottle mentioned above.
The top of the decor ones comes off with the slightest of impact.
I was wondering why the top can come off, then realised that Decor has their logo embossed on the top.
Chances are it is to allow interchangeable tops for different brands.
The Kmart one linked above is noticeably different.
I had bought it couple of years ago. I feel majority of it's reviews are fake.
This is only good for cleaning fridge, microwave and perhaps a reasonably clean kitchen.
For everywhere else, it feels like cleaning with water.
Really over priced for what is it. Doesn't clean stains. only upside is it doesn't smell like anything
Overpriced for what it is. Most reviews are fake or sponsored. Their marketing is good, plenty of suckers gullible enough to buy it.
A true ozbargainer would make their own cleaning solution!!!
The newish released, Koh equivalent, Thank You multipurpose cleaner performs better IMO and can be diluted to the required 'grade' of cleaning power. The Koh pouch was on special last week at WW for $16.95…the flimsy spray bottle and a few microfiber cloths aren't worth the extra $15.
I find the thankyou cleaner smells a little like vomit. I guess the familiarity of lactic acid. I’d never buy it again.
The company stated the odour was an issue with the initial batch that was manufactured. They are processing swaps for those that want to. As for the flimsy bottle, it's actually decent, but still prone to breaking, and unlike the thankyou one which is stainless steel…isn't worth the extra $ as I stated.
I'd say the bottle is anything but flimsy and is a key selling point. Maybe they got worse in recent years? Love the way it continuously sprays for area coverage and works upside down.
I've got one from less than a year ago and as you say, the bottle is excellent.
All of this just smells like marketing BS to me - "Eco Certified" cleaning products just sound like the modern day equivalent of magic weight loss pills.
Like at the end of the day, is this any different to a run of the mill commercial cleaning product (e.g. https://www.amazon.com.au/White-King-Multi-Purpose-Cleaner/d…), which is $15 for 5L that you would dilute 1:5 (so effectively you get 25L of cleaning solution)?
You can just re-use spray bottles, or just buy better quality plastic ones from Kmart (or your favourite discount store) for a few bucks. Microfibre cloths are also pretty cheap - can get a whole bag full of them at Bunnings.
Always valuable to get the opinion of someone who hasn't used it, great stuff.
I studied chemistry at university, so I think I have some qualifications to give an opinion.
I can tell you that all cleaning products are either dilute acids or bases (usually like lactic acid or sodium hydroxide), depending on whether they're targeted at disinfecting (generally acidic), or grease busting (generally basic). There also cleaning agents that try to dissolve stains or tough, chemically complex spills (e.g. paint) - these would be solvents, e.g. methyl spirits, turpentines, alcohols…etc.
There is no patented "special sauce" that gives you magical cleaning abilities. If something "works better" than other things, usually it's either because it's the right product for the job (e.g. using a alkaline cleaning solution for grease), or because it's more concentrated than the competition.
I'm sure this is "great stuff", but so is basically every other "right for the job" cleaning solution.
Apart from the fact that you certainly don't need a chem degree to know any of that, none of it tells you how well any particular product actually works in the real, actual world.
none of it tells you how well any particular product actually works in the real, actual world
It actually does, this is just science at the end of the day. Only two things matter, what's the active ingredient and what's the concentration.
You haven't given a single reason for why you think this could work better.
@p1 ama: And what and how you're using it on.
I'm not arguing for it particularly, just against the idea that a degree (yes, even a science degree) gives you powers to see how people are using things and thus how they'll work, irrespective of the theory.
I'm all for people making their own if they have the facilities to do so rather than buying this, but if they can't, then this works well.
just against the idea that a degree (yes, even a science degree) gives you powers to see how people are using things and thus how they'll work, irrespective of the theory
What do you mean by how people are using things? It's a cleaning solution, people use it to clean surfaces. You're being a bit obtuse here, of course, there will always be edge use cases. However, in order to develop and engineer things, we have to make broad assumptions about how things will (usually) be used.
And what do you mean by "irrespective of the theory"? These are not hypotheses, we're talking about reactions that are extremely well understood, and have been studied extensively.
At the end of the day, the active ingredient in this cleaner is KOH (potassium hydroxide), which is identical to any other cleaner that also uses KOH as an active ingredient in (roughly) the same concentration, and is almost identical to any other alkaline cleaner (e.g. NaOH). KOH is KOH, there is no "magic".
I'm all for people making their own if they have the facilities to do so rather than buying this, but if they can't, then this works well.
As I said earlier, I'm sure that this works fine. The question is value, you're paying $33 for 1.8L of cleaning solution, a bottle and two microfibre cloths, which is objectively a lot for a product that will give you the same results as a bottle of Ajax (or similar) from your local supermarket, or commercial cleaning solutions (which are even cheaper).
What you are paying for is the marketing hype, I think people ought to know that.
@p1 ama: Your right, this product for what it contains, (less than 1%KOH) is a poor choice as a functional cleaner, the concentration is way low.
Good quality, effective products will generally have 10% caustic and roughly an equal amount of surfactant such as alcohol ethoxylates or alkyl sulphates. By itself KOH isn't really a great cleaner, it is OK at cutting grease but doesn't help break down or lift anything else. At 1% it's just not sufficient for anything but the smallest amount.
Your totally right Ajax will likely perform superior as it has a blend of alkyl sulphate and abrasive, which is a much better mix than straight caustic.
I am an industrial chemist and have worked running the largest manufacturing plant for industrial cleaning and hygiene products here, all products are formulated to blend alkali and surfactant, not a single one is just an alkali as they simply don't do what's needed.
FWIW 48% KOH solution, which is the industrial standard, is under $2/kg. So you are paying $55 full whack for 2c worth of material, packaging and cloths…… The packaging alone it multiple times what the product is worth
I got one a few years ago. Not very impressed.
For what it’s worth Woolies had it out for the same price today, including free grout brush.
Being caught up with marketing and a mark down, I purchased one. I have no idea why. I personally love BAM bleach - probably the direct opposite of Koh.
https://www.woolworths.com.au/shop/productdetails/0000000000…So whats OzB fav surface cleaner then?
Tears of missed bargains
I just grab a 5L bottle of isopropyl alcohol (Can grab from Melbourne/Sydney solvents on sale for $<30.)
Dilute with water in a spray bottle and voila.
Best stuff ever IMO.
Been trying to track down one of the mops, no luck. I've tried a few locations too. It's listed under product delays on their site, but it's said "new sale date to be confirmed" for days. Anyone know how long it can take for them to get stock on delayed items?
Plus postage??