This soda stain has me stumped.

[Bill D]

I don't see the necessity of the above comments. Frankly, it is exactly these kinds of posts that lead to flames and that is something we don't tolerate here. Either contribute positively to the thread or move on. Thank you.

 

[GeneralEclectic]

I don't see the necessity of the above comments. Frankly, it is exactly these kinds of posts that lead to flames and that is something we don't tolerate here. Either contribute positively to the thread or move on. Thank you.

It's not only that, but the guy attacks me for something I didn't say! I don't mind constructive criticism when I'm in error, but in this case what I said was completely correct. My motivation was nothing more than trying to contribute something a bit out of the usual box to resolving this problem, and that's the thanks I get.



If you think about it, P&G probably has 10x the number of PhDs working on nothing but stain removal than that found in all car-cleaning-products companies combined. Common laundry products are anything but simple and should be part of your toolkit. Ignore their capabillities and you're missing a bet.

 

[salty]

Not to start anything but enzymes are a protein and are not living. And can be good for some protein stains.



Bacteria are living.



Both also have a place in odor removal.

 

[imported_Grouse]

I tried red stain remover:

After brushing the stain remover into the stain and allowing it to sit for 5 minutes, I dropped a damp towel on the area and followed with a heating iron. The stain came out 80%, but not enough that I could rightly bill the customer for my work.



Should I be heating through a dry towel?

Hey mate I have 6 years of exp as an IIRC certified carpet tech.



and 60-80% is what you can expect. Synthetic dyes in pop can be difficult. Pro's choice actually makes two versions or did when i was in the industry. One for natural dyes and one for synthetic.



this is the correct product to use, in reality besides replacing it is your only option. A couple of things to remember when dealing with red dyes.



the product you use will improve the stain about 60-80% and sometimes as the oxidizer reacts it might improve more over the next 24 hours. That is the best you can hope for. Sell the customer the improvement not the promise of removal. Undersell over deliver.



depending on the type of fiber, and construction you have to be very carefull about heat from the iron and how clean the iron is. You can over steam some fibers and remove the dyes in the carpet pile. that's right it will look like you bleached the fiber. From my days of doing cars, most vehicles are solution dyed but you never ever know. when using pro's choice or prochems red remover you need to steam for 15 seconds and check waiting about 10 secons for the fiber to cool. the next important part is you will notice the iron building up a a white paste like power on it. this has to be wiped off with a clean wet towel.

It impeeds the chemical reaction from the two combined chemicals. If the build up gets real heavy heat the iron on a counter till it is at full heat and unplug it and douse it under water and scrub. BTW this chemical proceess eats irons like crazy. You also don't want an iron with teflon or any of that junk on it. That will burn and flake clogging your vents. simple cheep stainless steel.



Okay a couple of things that might have helped. A simple detergent clean of the area to remove the sugars and soda residue. This is key because the two part chemical needs to work directly on the dye not on gummy carpet. You must in cases where there is a large type of residue, soda, urine, sugars, wine, detergents like resolve, or poorly cleaned fiber first remove that contaminating material.



step one would be light spritzing with a comercial slurry agent. Ie point blue, clean green, dry slurry. Lightly brush in. very lightly. The idea is not to scrub but to besure the detergent is coating all the fiber surface it can. Scrubbing will not likely produce a noticible beninifit for you. It will how ever give you that rubbed mark shown in your picture above. many times those are permant. Trust me the chemical will do far more evenly distributed in 20 min than an hour of scrubbing will gain you.





Rinse out with a fiber rinse. this will offset the ph of the slurry Cleaner, which is a must for these kinds of soils. usually a good slurry will run a 10 on the ph scale, as we are dealing with a synthetic fiber there is nothign wrong with that. the fiber rinse will usually be a 3.5 or a 4 on the ph scale. bringing the fiber as close to ph of 7 as you can.



3rd step is to rinse again with water. yep because the fiber rinse will interfere with the two part red remover.



Dry stroke like mad... remove as much trace of moister you can.



Now start your 2 part red remover following the guidelines i mentioned about it above.



some times it helps to let it sit for more than 5 min. but just so you know the complete chemical reaction happens in little over 5 min... so if you let it sit you'll need to ad more before you apply the heat.



the final most critical thing is to be absolutely sure you put equal parts of the two in your 2 part solution mix.



anywho any questions feel free to ask.



~Aaron.



PS on a side note. Enzymes are usually for protien soils, they do not do anything for particulate soil or dyes.

 

[imported_Grouse]

in a business situation, how do you deal with this?



obviously your time is worth $, but if you can't get the stain out, you aren't providing anything to the customer.. so do you still charge for spending 2 hours trying to get the stain out, or eat the loss?

Spotting in general is something i never charged for. My customers paid enough in the Cleaning it self spotting was part of that price. yes that included urine stains and red stains.



if they called me out to clean the stain only I was sure to tell them that stain removal is part of my cleaning process, some do come out some do not. I would atempt it to the fullest of my capabilities and equipment.



When i see a stain like this. I usualy prep my customer with.



" well sir/mam you can expect about 60-80% improvement. It will be a faint stain. If you would like me to continue with the process i will."



You undersell and over deliver all stain removals. I've had thousands of red stains of both natural and synthetic dyes come out 100%. I've have twice that not come completely out. so you err on the side of caution, inform you customer, and proceed with their blessing.



In a detail situation i think i would still put spotting and stain removal into the price of cleaning the fiber and fabric in a car. you are after being hired to clean the fiber and fabric correct? Not the fiber and fabric areas around all spots and stains or fiber and fabric areas excluding stains.



You'll find the more you just clean the stains and spots as a matter of your fiber and fabric cleaning process the more successful you will be at removing them, the more exp you gain the less time each will take in the future. With the added succes the happier your customer will be.



in short it's about having a good conversation with your customer and providing the top quality work they are paying for.



~Aaron

 

[imported_Grouse]

I've taken out some very bad stains (coke, tea, tomato, red wine, blood, emesis, other miscellaneous bodily fluids) with Tide HE laundry detergent. Clean it with water first to remove loose stuff and all other chemicals that can kill the enzymes, then pat dry. Apply the Tide full strength and let set for at least an hour, more is better, overnight is perfect, covered with a piece of plastic wrap to keep it moist. In addiiton to having some advanced detergents, the Tide has "enzymes" that have the ability to "eat" all manner of stains, including stains that chlorine bleach won't touch. Use an extractor with clean cool water to pull out the Tide. The only downside to using the Tide is that in many cases with old carpeting it will leave a clean spot that makes the rest of it look bad. Depending on the state of the carpeting, you might have to plan ahead for that and treat a larger area. Alternatively if you have time, you could test on a small spot to see whether it's going to work or not. Make sure you find the "HE" type detergent because it has the most enzymes and it's very low sudsing, making extraction quicker.

I don't know where to begin with this. you are making some very poor assumptions. I suggest you take some time and head here.

http://www.iicrc.org/



This is basically the industry standard for training of carpet, hard surface, upholstry and repair services.

 

[autoprincess]

Believe me when I say this, those colored stains including grape and coffee stains are very difficult, close to imposible to remove. There is NOTHING on the market that removes these colors, because what happens is they actually dye the carpet therefore cleaning can not remove it. Your best bet is to completely dye the carpet. You can spend all day and hundreds of dollars on chemicals that claim to work, but we and customers are picky and we want the stain removed not lightend and because there is nothing that removes them, move on and let the customer know it's a lost cause and they only option is dying the carpet.