I'm happy with my new top rated LG washing machine. But the cycles and modifiers seemed much more logical on my 2010 Whirlpool washer.
The important difference seems to be 'Turbo Wash.' In the Normal and Heavy Duty cycles it cannot be deselected. So another way of looking at it is that 'Turbo Wash' is integral to those cycles.
But I can't much use Turbo Wash because of one thing. It often leaves flat pieces of cloth pinned to the back plate of the wash tub. I don't imagine this as being either good for the material or good for cleaning. It's only natural that it would do this because it blasts jets of water from the front towards the back.
This has happened to me both for undershirts (for which 'Normal' would be the expected cycle) and for sheets (for which 'Bedding' may not be appropriate because it is designed for "large bulky items that have difficulty absorbing water" which clearly doesn't apply to sheets).
What I'd like would be 'Normal' but without the Turbo, but it seems that LG is almost insisting that you use their new timesaving and deep cleaning feature. As it is now, it seems I can only safely wash small items, like socks or washcloths, using Turbo. For the washcloths I could also use 'Towels.' Curiously the Towels cycle does not allow Turbo to be selected.
The cycles that seems to generally work best for things that don't work well with Turbo seem to be Permanent Press and Towels. The others like Heavy Duty and Sanitary have specialized applications (you don't want to use them on most clothes).
And then there is also Delicate. But Delicate doesn't allow you to have anything but a slower spin which means most clothes will retain a lot of water. So while it works well for actual delicate clothing, it's not a stand-in for 'Normal.' It's not good for undershirts or sheets in good condition. I'm not yet sure which of Delicates or Permanent Press is the optimal cycle for the cotton pullover shirts I wear every day.
So even though my undershirts are not "Permanent Press" I must use the "Permanent Press" cycle for them because the other options aren't good. This is much like the Kenmore washing machine I used in 1960. I recall we used "Permanent Press" for everything. Which was fine because my mother believed actual Permanent Press was the best thing ever, even though a lot of Permanent Press back in those days wasn't very permanently pressed.
