An Interesting Method to Remove Carpet Stains

Removing stains from you carpeting can be a tedious chore, but it must be done to preserve the life of your carpet. I have mentioned many different cleaning methods for the various stains you may encounter.  Today I came across a video of a carpet cleaning process that is said to be able to be used on any types of stains and carpeting. But as the video’s disclaimer reads, you use this advice at your own risk. This is pretty much what all tip websites and videos sites have to say now for their protection. But let’s focus on the video.

The usual tools we see come out, white towels, dish soap, buckets, and water. The extra step added by the man in the video, is the use of a steam iron. Instead of just blotting up the stain, as most tips sites tell you, he applies a dish soap and hot water solution. After pouring a bit of that solution on the stain, he layers white rags soaked in hot water on top of the stain. Then he uses his iron on medium heat and low steam to work over the towels. Over time this will start to steam up the stain, which will rise and get collected in the wet rags. He repeats this process as necessary, until the stain is removed. When the stain is gone, he works to remove any soap residue and water by applying dry white towels. He also employs the use of a wet/dry vac.

I just gave a brief summary, check out the video here:

Cleaning Up Cat Vomit and Poop from your Floor and Carpeting

If you now have or have ever had cats as pets, you know about the vomit and hairballs. Sometimes if a cat has a feeder or constant access to dry food, they will gorge themselves. If this happens they may tend to throw it up later on, into what will look like a mushy tube of dry cat food. We never really know if it is from the amount of food, something in the food, or another variable altogether.

To clean up cat vomit, the easiest way is the get some paper towels and pick up the solid contents. Cleanup will be easier on hardwood or laminate floors than on carpeting. On solid flooring any liquid residue can be easily wiped up with some towels. On carpeting, you need to try and get the residue up before it sets into the carpet. You can do this by sopping up the liquid with cloth or paper towels. Then to further help remove any stain, get a rag with some soapy water and scrub the area a bit. Enough to loosen the stain, over scrubbing may work against you and drive the stain in deeper.

The same idea can be applied to stray cat poop. Cats constantly groom themselves and prefer clean areas. If a cat’s litter box is not cleaned regularly, they will decide not to use it and do their business in an area next to the box or somewhere else. Again if this happens on a hard surface it will be easier to clean up than that of a fibrous surface like carpet. So if you keep your litter box in a carpeted room, be sure to keep it clean. Kittens may go in different spots around the house, until they adjust to the use of a litter box.

Tips For Cleaning Vomit From Carpeting

As vile as it is, vomit is a fact of life. At points of your life you will encounter it, and have to deal with it. It may come from a pet that ate too fast, a sick child with the flu, or a friend who has had too much to drink. Whatever the case may be, you hope that it doesn’t happen in your house, but if it does, not on your carpet or furniture. Dare to dream, right? When it does happen, act fast to hopefully avoid any permanent stains and that lingering vomit smell.

As usual, clean up as much of the vomit as you can. Try not to make the stain worse by spreading it out. Avoid over scrubbing, as this just makes the stain go deeper into the carpet. Treat the area with dish soap and let it set in. Then rinse out the detergent with cold water. Proceed to blot up the water with a clean towel or rag. Repeat as necessary, until the stain has been removed. Ammonia may also be used to help remove the stain, but be careful with chemicals such as Ammonia because it can discolor your carpet. If you want to use Ammonia, test a small-unseen portion of carpeting to see what effect it has. If the vomit odor still remains in the carpeting, treat it with baking soda. Spread it as liberally as you want to and vacuum it up when you are ready to.

Cleaning Dog Poop Out Of Your Carpet

Anyone who has dogs has done it at one time or another. You go out into your backyard and unknowingly step in your dog’s mess. Since you didn’t realize you stepped it in it, you track it back through your house. Eventually you will start to smell it, if you haven’t seen it in your carpeting yet. Or maybe you have indoor dogs and they didn’t quite make it outside to do their business.

As with many carpet stains, the sooner you see it and take care of it, the less of a chance that it will become a permanent stain. So be calm and work fast to avoid further carpet damage.

Step 1—Collect the poop and any debris from the area and throw it out. Blot up any liquid mess.

Step 2 – Next you can treat the area with a variety of different cleaning products. You can spray on some laundry stain remover to pre-treat the stain. Next get some soapy water and a brush to scrub the area. Keep clean towels handy to blot up the liquid and keep the moisture level in the carpet. Repeat this process until the stain is gone.

Step 3—There may be some odor of the dog poop left behind after the stain is gone. The help get rid of the odor; treat the area with a half and half mix of vinegar and water. Repeat the process of pouring the mix on the stain and drying it up with towels. Baking soda is also good for absorbing odor, so you can sprinkle some on the stained area and let it settle in. Leave it there for a good amount of time and then vacuum it up.

Maybe you like to have a lot of burning candles in your home, or perhaps you or your family smokes in the house. In another case you may have a fireplace that may spew out some hot ash onto your floor from the crackling wood. Whatever the case may be, chances are that at some point in time a candle may fall or some cigarette ash may fall onto the carpet and cause a burn. In this event, you don’t want to have to replace the whole carpet or hire a carpet cleaning company, so here are a few suggestions for quick fixes you may want to try out.

If it is just a small spot burn, you can try to clean up the area. Get some lightweight sandpaper and work on the small area to remove the charred melted fibers. After you have ground down the area, vacuum up the debris. If the burn was small enough to be removed by this, you can stop now.

If the burned area was more damaged or the burn is still visible after sanding it off, you may want to consider replacing that small section of carpet. If this is the case, you will want to carefully cut out the affected area of carpeting with a carpet knife or equally sharp tool. To get the replacement pieces, you can either buy a small square section of carpeting from a home improvement store, or you can transplant a piece of the existing carpeting. You would want to cut it out of an existing area of carpeting that is unseen, like inside of a closet or under the couch. Once you have cut out your replacement piece, you can glue it down into its new location. The use of a hot glue gun is suggested. Make sure all of the seams have glue on them and once set in; roll over the carpeting with a carpet tractor. Let the glue dry before walking on this piece of carpet.

From moving the lawn and doing random yard work, you will manage to collect lawn clippings and soil onto your shoes. Then when you go back into your house, you will bring those pieces of the lawn with you. Hopefully you will notice any grass or dirt you track on you carpet. You want to try and clean it before it gets too worked in. So the sooner you notice it, the better chances you have of completely removing the stain. As with other stains the cleaning methods can start to share the same processes.

Some helpful tips:

• Do your best to pick up any debris and remnants that you can. Whatever loose material you can’t pickup by hand; you can try to vacuum up. If there is any mud on your carpet, let it dry before vacuuming it up.
• When you have removed the loose content of the stain, you can start to clean up any grass stain that is in the carpet.
• One method requires the use of a solution of one part of ammonia to two parts water. Ammonia can be substituted with Vinegar. Though other sources say using Ammonia may permanently set in the stain. When working with potentially bleaching chemicals, one should test out their solution on a small portion of the material that is to be treated. Apply sparingly to the affected area and let it settle. Then rinse it out with cold water.
• Similar methods to that above have been described with the use of hydrogen peroxide or liquid dish soap. Treat the stained area with the solution, let it absorb into the stain, and rinse with clean water.

Do not leave excess liquid in your carpeting. Be sure to soak up the rinse water with some clean white rags or towels.

Cleaning Coffee Stains From Your Carpet

Of all the things you can spill on your carpeting, coffee is no exception. The clean up process is pretty similar to my last couple cleaning post. But honestly how much variety could there be in carpet cleaning methods? What works, works. As with most stains, it is best to clean it up as soon as it happens.

To start out:

• Blot up the stain with a clean white dry towel or rag.
• Next I have seen a few suggestions. The first one suggests using club soda on the stain, letting that set in and blotting it up. The other suggests using a detergent solution on the stain instead of club soda. And another uses vinegar as a part of the solution.
• You can repeat the last process as many times as you want, or until the stain is gone. If the stain is really tough, some other cleaning methods have suggested applying hydrogen peroxide, letting it set in ,and then rinse and blot it up. The same has been mentioned for dry cleaning solvent.
• When you are done treating the stain, rinse it clean with some cold water and then blot up the water.

This video goes over their recommended cleaning process. Enjoy.

If you have an accident or some other unfortunate event, you may get some blood on your carpet. Like most stains, it is best to clean it up as soon as it happens. But one is not always able to do this. Dried blood can be a permanent stain, but it never hurts to try to clean it.

 Here are a few helpful tips to help you clean up that stain.

• Use clean preferably white rags and towels to start blotting up the stain. Try not to spread the stain around by rubbing at it.
• Pour a small amount of detergent on the stain and work it in a little. Let it settle in and then blot it up.
• Pour some ammonia on the stain and allow it to set in. After a few minutes you can then blot it up.
• Hopefully the last few steps broke up the stain enough to remove it. If so, you just need to rinse the stained area with some clean water. And of course, you guessed it, blot it up with a clean white towel or rag. You may have to repeat the cleaning a process a couple of times for dried blood stains.

Some other cleaning remedies list using shaving cream to release the stain. Others mention combinations of salt-water paste, club soda, and mild peroxide. So hopefully you will never need to use this advice, but if you do,  you’ll be glad to know it is here.

Say you are having a party, and someone manages to spill their wine. Now you have a potential stain on your nice carpeting. What should you do now? First of all don’t panic, but don’t wait to clean up the stain either. Don’t just start to wipe up the stain, because chances are you will just end up spreading it instead of removing it. If the stain is fresh, try to blot it up with a towel or rag. With any luck there will be little to no stain left behind.

If the stain went unnoticed and has set in, you can still attempt to clean it out.

1.     Make a solution of mild soap or detergent and warm water.

2.     Pour a little on the stain and let it set in.

3.     Blot the solution out of the stained area.

4.     Make a solution of white vinegar and warm water.

5.     Again apply the solution and blot it up.

6.     Repeat steps 1 to 3 with the same soap solution.

7.     Apply clean water to the stain to rinse out the other two solutions. Use a sponge for good results.

8.     Blot up the water.

Another process is also said to work. In this process you:

1. Pour Hydrogen Peroxide on the stain and let it set in.
2. Create a solution of one part water and one part carpet cleaning shampoo. Put this solution into a spray bottle and apply it to the stain.
3. Blot up the stain.

Hopefully, one of these processes will get your stain out. However some stains will become permanent. It is not always certain how a cleaning chemical may affect your carpeting, so it is a wise idea to test your solution on a small-unseen section of carpeting to see if there are any undesired results.

If you have ever had an indoor pet, sometimes they have a tendency to mark to their territory. If that marked spot happens to be your carpet, then you may notice a stain the spot the spraying occurred and a noticeable smell.

Your best chance to remedy this is to act quickly and blot the stain to try and soak as much of it up as you can. Even if you don’t see it right away, the sooner you attempt to clean it the better. As I mentioned in my last post, you best methods of cleaning the stain are simple mixes of ammonia and water or water and dish soap. You may not be able to completely remove the stain, but you still want to get as most of it out as you can.

For the smell, try a mix of vinegar and water. This is the ideal way to attempt to remove the odors. Your carpet may reek of vinegar for awhile, but it is better than the alternative.

There are also enzyme cleaners out there, which are supposed to break down the urine. I have seen mixed reviews on those. Some people seem to love them and say that they work great, while others say it was only a temporary fix. Temporary meaning that the stains and odors returned after a period of time.