Death cleaning [puke]

klnyc

klnyc

Deep scratch guy.
Okay guys,



Any of you pro detailer every done a detail where person has committed suicide or a person has died in the car? I know it's kinda gross and crap, but I have to ask :eek:
 
I have *seen* a couple cars like that but never cleaned one. One in particular had lots of brain matter scattered about. I wouldn't touch it for $5000!!
 
Oh yeah, since the guys "method" was to stuff a sawed off in his mouth, there was all kinds of bone fragments and gross stuff stuck in the headliner to boot.
 
Oh man, that freakin' gross. Get your chemical suit ready, I wonder what kind of chemical you spray into the interior to get those dead smell out?
 
Some detailers specialize in this type of clean up. They charge big bucks because of the nature of the work. Professional Carwashing and Detailing magazine had an article about this particular topic a couple months back. I would do it for the right amount of money, which is a lot.
 
I get calls like that occasionally (not the suicide ones though) and my standard response is "I'm really booked up tight right now, it may be 2 weeks before I can get to it" and they always say "thanks but we need to get it taken care of sooner than that". Problem solved. Not worth turning down a nice S500 or SC430 to do something like that.



I'd look on autoint's site, I am sure the have odor neutralizers there. An ozone generator is also something that should take out the stench once it is cleaned.



I once cleaned out a car that had a bunch of blood in the passenger footwell (guy cut himself and was driven to the hospital and lost about 2 pints of blood into the carpet). The car had sat in the June Texas sun for 10 days with the windows rolled up tight the whole time. The stench almost knocked me over when I opened the doors. I just kept dumping in water and wetvaccing it out and pouring the bloody water into his apartment parking lot. Lots of flies buzzing around when I finished. Once the water wasn't turning red instantly, I scrubbed the carpets out with Magnum Upholstry Shampoo, rinced and wet vacced again. I was amazed how nice it turned out but I'll never take a job like that again...and yes, it was when I was first starting out and was pretty much taking every job that came along.
 
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I once cleaned out a car that had a bunch of blood in the passenger footwell (guy cut himself and was driven to the hospital and lost about 2 pints of blood into the carpet). The car had sat in the June Texas sun for 10 days with the windows rolled up tight the whole time. The stench almost knocked me over when I opened the doors. I just kept dumping in water and wetvaccing it out and pouring the bloody water into his apartment parking lot. Lots of flies buzzing around when I finished. Once the water wasn't turning red instantly,
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Scott I hope you wore at least latex gloves whilst doing thing, I would hate for someone to get a disease or blood related illiness from cleaning a car..
 
Ugh, just hearing about this makes me think of the scene from "Pulp Fiction". There'd have to be some pretty sick money in it for me to take a car that bad (although I have done a minivan with stuff GROWING in it, but that's still not chunks of brain bad).



I think my cleanup method on a shotgun suicide would involve a little diesel and a zippo. Its just not worth trying to fix it, IMHO.



P.S. what kind of a$$hole commits suicide in a car? Don't they know someone will have to clean up after them? I mean cmon, do it in the bathtub, or the pavement, or anywhere else hoseable.



-Tim
 
In my opinion, this kind of request is not a cleanup job, but an interior replacement job. Sure you can clean up some spillage here and there, but a dead person in a car is bit extreme.



Even if someone offed themselves with pills. He's probably going to puke all over in the final moments, then urinate when he dies. If he's been sitting there for a while, say days, then you'll probably have some decomposed matter stuck to the fabric. And I haven't even mentioned blood.



You can do your best to mitigate the mess, but once the deodorant wears away, you still have a stinky interior that will need replacement.
 
Yup, not worth it at all. Even sometime my kids threw-up on the seat with that it already make me wanna puke.
 
tegboy said:
Scott I hope you wore at least latex gloves whilst doing thing, I would hate for someone to get a disease or blood related illiness from cleaning a car..
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Yes, I wore gloves. I should have known it would be bad when I was told "It's just a little bit of blood". :(
 
Scottwax said:
Yes, I wore gloves. I should have known it would be bad when I was told "It's just a little bit of blood". :(
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I think I would have wanted the full Ebola safe suit before working on someone elses blood....
 
Lol, interesting topic. To be honest I am looking into getting into this type of work right now. Been thinking about it alot lately and it seems to be very profitable insurance work. There's alot to learn to be safe while doing it.
 
googledude said:
[...]it seems to be very profitable insurance work.
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But don't forget to deduct the cost of the HazMat suit! I'd go with MythBusters and gut the interior, or mask it as best you can and try to pass it off hahahaha
 
Hey some body got to do it, I say if a person can take it or have the mental ability then go for it and make that money as I'm sure theres plenty of seeing how most shy away from this sort of work. Me nahh I can't risk it health wise nor can I risk bringing something home to my family either, I'm too paranoid to get involved in that sort of work.
 
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