Keep Your Car Carpet Looking Great with These 9 Tips
If you are like most car owners in the United States, you care about how your car looks. While most people take care to have their cars washed, not as much attention is often paid to the inside of the car. Keeping your custom car carpet clean and looking great can take some work and effort. If yours is more than ten years old, you might want to think getting replacement carpet. Otherwise, these tips should help keep it looking good for longer.
- Use an upholstery protector. Before you get any dirt or stains on your custom car carpet, you should treat it with an upholstery protector. This is one way to deal with spills and stains before they happen. When you spill something on the carpet, it will be easier to keep that spill from becoming a stain.
- Use paint thinner and salt to deal with grease. If you get grease on your floor mats or on your custom car carpet, the best thing you can do is use a little paint thinner to get rid of it. Take a clean rag and rub some paint thinner into the grease. Pour on some salt. The salt should absorb the grease. Leave this overnight and then take a vacuum and get rid of all of it. Like any other kind of chemical, you should test the paint thinner on a hidden area to make sure it does not hurt the color.
- Deal with coffee as soon as you can. Most drivers will drink coffee when they are driving and it is not unusual for people to spill it. When that happens, use cold water and cloths or paper towels to remove the stain. If blotting with cold water and paper towels does not work, you should use glass cleaner to remove the stain. Spray the stain, leave for a few minutes, blot with cold water and a clean cloth.
- Use hairspray on ink. You do not need this to be expensive hairspray. In fact, you may want to buy some cheap hairspray to have around the house as it will take ink out of just about anything from clothes to your custom car carpet. Spray the area until it is soaked and then blot out the stain with paper towels. If you need to clean clothing that has ink, just soak and then wash as you normally do.
- Use salt for ink. If you do not have any hairspray, you can use salt to leach out the ink stain. Pour on the salt. When the stain has been absorbed by the salt, brush or vacuum it away and you will be left with no stain.
- Use baking soda and water to neutralize puke. If anyone, human or animal, gets sick in the car, you should deal with the vomit with a combination of baking soda and water. The contents of most stomachs can be very acidic so you need to deal with that by using something neutral like baking soda.
- Boric acid can help with smells. If your custom car carpet has started to have a bad odor, you should sprinkle a generous amount of boric acid around the car. Let this sit overnight and then vacuum it up.
- Deal with fleas with boric acid. Do you like to take your pets with you on the road? If you do and you find that you are having problems with fleas, if you do the same thing you would do for bad smells, you will kill any fleas and their eggs. This is a safe and non-toxic way to deal with insects. Boric acid can work in the home to ward off roaches, ants and other insects. Boric acid is a great way to get rid of bugs without using dangerous chemicals but should be kept out of food and away from kids and pets.
- Use ammonia to brighten your carpet. Take one pint of water and mix in four ounces of ammonia. Use a sponge to apply that to your nylon car carpet. Never use this on wool. Leave the mixture to dry on your carpet.
These are simple things you can do to keep your car carpet looking like new.
