Carpet cleaning tips for those little accidents around your home.
We have all been there, from walking in with muddy feet to dropping a mug of tea on a carpet.
Its part of life, sometimes rushing out to buy an expensive wonder cleaning spray from the supermarket just isn’t the answer. Here are some carpet cleaning tips / hints that cold get you out of trouble in the event of a nasty stain appearing on a carpet in your home. We are experienced National Carpet Cleaners association members with over 35 years of stain removal.
KEEP YOUR HOME CLEAN
Keep your carpet clean! Just like sheets on your bed or towels in your bathroom, carpets need cleaning.
Leaving stains and spills to settle in your carpet isn’t advised. We suggest cleaning your carpet each year. This will maintain a clean and healthy environment to live. Keeping the indoor air quality at a good level as well as carpeted areas looking clean and fresh.
Most modern carpet is cleanable. With different cleaning methods designed to clean various types of floor covering. Stains will be easier to remove if they are not left for lengthy periods of time. We hope that our stain cleaning tips will help you deal with difficult stains in your home.
This stain was actually Port. And of course, it had landed on a cream fitted carpet.
A stain like this immediately strikes horror into the person dropping it as it looks terrible.
So before rushing to the kitchen and grabbing the first bottle that resembles carpet cleaning solution, read some of our carpet cleaning suggestions below.
They may not only save you money on expensive products at the supermarket, but also potential damage to your carpet fibres. Most domestic sprays contain bleach and detergent, both of which we do not use in our process.
Carpet cleaning tips for your home.
Beverage stains – coffee, wine, beer, fruit juice – Quickly use a non colourfast cotton hand towel or similar, soak up as much of the spill as you can. Using a moist micro fibre towel or sponge dampen the stain, working from the outside to the inside. Blot (no scrubbing) using a dry cloth with stable colour. A dry micro fibre cloth or terry towel is a good choice. Dry off using a hair drier at seven inches away from the carpet fibres.
Stains that are greasy – lipstick, chocolate, butter, foundation – A cotton bud is a good option, dipped in surgical spirit, again working in from the edge of the stain. Again, blot with a dry micro fibre cloth or terry towel. When the stain stops transferring onto the cloth, stop. Dampen. mix a quarter of a teaspoon of carpet shampoo with two litres of water, then add an egg cup of white vinegar. Use some cotton wool to apply the solution to the carpet fibres. Now blot with a terry towel or kitchen roll. Dry off using a hair dry at seven inches, keep it moving!
Dried in stains – Using the mix of water, shampoo and white vinegar as described above, apply moisture to the dried in stain, try not to soak the area. Once again, blotting is the best way to draw stains out. Using kitchen roll or terry towels, remove as much moisture as possible. Using several layers of kitchen towel, apply this to the area that is now damp. Find a heavy book and place on top of the towel. This will help to absorb staining in the fibres.
Remove iced cream from a carpet – First of all, find a blunt knife and scrape away all residues from the carpet surface. Don’t be too rigorous. Apply a small amount of soapy water to the affected area. Dip a non colourfast cloth into clear water, wring this out. Blot the whole area with the damp cloth. Rinse the are by wringing out the water and re submerging the cloth as you go. Repeat until all evidence of the stain has gone.
Remove ink from your carpet – Absorb as much ink as possible using blotter paper or a cotton non colour-fast cloth. Apply a liberal quantity of white vinegar onto a clean cloth (like kitchen roll) Blot the ink stain with a cloth. Using a liberal quantity of ammonia on a cloth – blot. Rinse with cool water. Finally blot the area with a clean cloth. Vacuum the area to remove any further residue.
How to remove chewing gum from carpet – Freezing, place a bag of ice cubes or freezer pack on the chewing gum. Wait for the gum to stiffen. Once frozen, scrape off the gum residue using a blunt object. Exercise care when doing so. Method 2 – Using WD-40. Hold the can around 7 inches from the chewing gum, spray directly onto the gum surface. No allow a dwell time of around five minutes. This lets the spray penetrate the gum, it will slowly release its grip on the fibres. Scrape the residue away and blot the area using a non colourfast terry towel.
Many stains in homes are caused by pets. Dogs and cats can generate a multitude of accidents, from chewing up pens to throwing up.
If you act quickly, stains like these won’t end up as carpet fibre damage.
Did you know a survey conducted by the carpet cleaning association discovered that almost 80% of homes in the United Kingdom have pets. 60% of whom had reported staining from their pets on their carpet. Most commonly faeces, urine and vomit.
Urine is considered to be the most problematic stain to deal with. If left, will leave fibre damage. So, swiftly dealing with pet urine will safeguard the life expectancy of your carpet.
How to deal with pet urine on your carpet – Blot up as much of the urine as you can. Paper towels or a terry towel are both a good option. Try not to scrub as this will spread the urine. Make a 50/50 mix of water and white vinegar, spray the solution directly onto the carpet. Let this mix sit for around ten minutes. This will give the vinegar a chance to neutralize ammonia content in the fibres. Now blot the area. Sprinkle baking soda on the affected areas and leave for 15 minutes. Recover the baking soda with a vacuum cleaner.
Removing cat vomit from your carpet – Firstly, with a blunt knife scrape up all solid matter. Do not rub the fibres. Use paper towels or a non colour fast cloth to blot. As with dog urine, make an equal mix of white vinegar and water, spray the affected area. Allow the mix to work for 10 minutes. Blot and then apply a liberal quantity of baking soda, this will help to absorb the remaining odour and moisture. Vacuum up the baking soda.
We hope that these cleaning tips help you to remove spills and stains in your home. If they don’t simply fill in our get a quotation page, we are here to help.
Sometimes its a better idea not to to attempt stain removal. This image shows a tomato soup stain on a living room rug. No amount of domestic spotters will remove a stain like this. Our specialist rug cleaning studio was the only place to enable full removal. After three hours, we managed to completely remove all traces of the soup!
