subject: Common Carpet Stains And How To Get Rid Of Them [print this page] The flipside of wall-to-wall carpeting comforts is the darkness of its doomwell, your carpet is set up for that. But, say its new or clean for now so you want to keep it that way, but stains are inevitable. So what do you do?
Not all carpets today come with stain-resistant coatings. While there are many common stains on the household carpet, unfortunately, not many owners know how to take them out. These common stains include acidic substances (such as tile cleaning compounds and drain cleaners), bleach, blood, chewing gum, coffee, dye stains, nail polish, ink, red stains like Kool Aid, red wine, rust, urine and wax.
Most stains are removed by the flush-blot-extract-dry process. Acids, for example, should be flushed with water as soon as possible to wash off loose parts of the stain. After it has been flushed, apply a solution of one tablespoon baking soda in one quart of warm water with a sponge or soft cloth. This will neutralize the stain that was not initially washed out. Flush the area again, then extract and dry the carpet with a fan quickly.
A well-known Bellevue carpet cleaning company suggests in their website that using a dry cleaning solvent to work in and blot out a chewing gum carpet mess would minimize drying time. Bleach, unfortunately, cannot be removed as it removes dye from the carpet. You can instead spot-dye your carpet to replace the lost color. Dye stains, on the other hand, can also be removed by spot dyeing.
For colored liquid stains like coffee, ink, red stains and urine, flushing, blotting, extracting and drying is still the best process. With red wine, though, Bellevue carpet cleaning experts suggest that stain should be flushed with white wine to make removal easier by recreating the original condition of the wine.
Fresh rust stains can easily be removed with flushing, blotting, extracting and drying. Wax stains, on the other hand, are solid so they can be removed by breaking them down, vacuuming and by putting paper on it and ironing to melt the remaining wax. For stains you cant D-I-Y, it is best to contact your Bellevue carpet cleaning guys.
