Umm carpet smell removal?

[anathema]

So let's say someone spilled water on the floor from a saltwater tank, and they thought they cleaned it all up, but the room is starting to smell, what should they do.

What cleaner can I use around my tank to clean my carpet? I mean uhh, since I might know someone who's carpet smells that is...:D

[vanguard]

I had a spill a few months ago. The smell I had was more of a mildew smell than a rotting/death smell. I got that smell even though I cleaned it up pretty well with one of those "steam" vacume cleaners (bissle).

This is what worked for me.

Remove as much liquid as you can with steam vac while hitting it with the carpet cleaning soap at the same time.

Let it dry completely. (This took three days or so)

Give it another cleaning.

My carpet is as good as new. If you don't have a steam vac you can rent them or hire guys to come from sears to come out and take care of them problem. I hope it works out well for your "friend".

[traveler911]

If your friends problem is not mildew, s/he can try Febreeze for the smell. Resolve does great on the initial spell for cleaning the mess up.

Hope this helps.

Kent

[Frick-n-Frags]

Are you folks talking about applying all this chemistry to the piece of carpet under/near your reef?? I hear Windex with Ammonia-D is the best glass cleaner out there too. HELLO! Seriously, especially aerosol stuff, spray it in the room and you have sprayed it in your reef. PPM of certain chemicals is all it takes......
That steam cleaning minus the soap sounds like the way to go, eventually the salt will get diluted out.
IMH(AOI)O: I really don't think repeated salt spills rots things. It ruins things, but if it dries, that is concentrated salt that nothing lives in/on it. Maybe if it never dries things will rot and I would guess that cleaning the carpet would not be the issue.
I made our neighbor downstairs' ceiling all sparkly when we lived in an apartment.

[nk57]

Not that I want to sound like an infomercial or anything but Oxyclean takes the smell aout of just about anything!

Nancy

[anathema]

I totally forgot about that stuff, and my mom even sent me some a while ago.

[sandy]

1 cup of white vinegar to one gal of hot water. Make sure you use white vinegar)

If it is really bad 2 cups of white vinegar to gal of hot water in your steam cleaner. This will neutralize everything and take out any soapy residue that is in your carpet.

When it dries it smells sweet and fresh smelling. It is not that bad of a smell either when it is wet. Will even get out oil.

I have steam cleaned my carpets in my house with this just to get up soap residue.

Inexpensive shampoo that is all natural and cleans great.

We (some of us) clean our salt build up from our pumps with it.

Regards,
Sandy

[Bryan]

I know the smell you are talking about. I have had many small disasters where small to moderate amounts of water have been soaked up by the carpet.

I use my wet/dry vac to suck up all the water I can out of the carpet and use a large fan to help dry it out. The smell seems to come about a day or so after the carpet has been soaked, and I believe it's mildew or mold. The smell usually alsts for about 2- days and disappears.

I haev pulled up some old carpet after it dried from a spill and I didn't notice anything different under the carpet or the underlay which surprised me.