Wet, Soapy Carpet... what to do??

[1ForAllFor1]

SO. I spilled some soap in my carpet (driver's side between the bottom of the accelerator and the little plastic pad embedded in the floor). It's just hand soap that I was using to clean the accelerator, but dear GOD has it created a mess. It made that spot on the carpet look terrible (all clumped up and gross). I've tried everything to get it out: Tuff Stuff, Blue Coral, vacuuming, you name it. Adding the cleaners only made the situation worse because they added MORE soap, and I ended up pushing all of the soap around and covering more of the carpet with it.

Well, I ended up taking my car into a detailing shop to get an opinion on what to do (mainly because I wanted to fix the ugly spot and get it back to looking like the rest of the carpet). The guy there told me to douse the area in as much hot water as possible and try to blot all the soap out.

I spent all day yesterday doing that. 4 hours. It’s absolutely impossible to remove all of the soap from the carpet. I got a LOT out, and I’ve managed to make the carpet look substantially better now (so long as all the threads are pushed the right way), but I’m concerned.

What should I do about the fact that there is still soap in the carpet? Just live with it? What about possible damage to the area of the carpet I was scrubbing? I want to get everything back to looking great. Does anyone have any idea how I should handle this, or what I should do to find a permanent fix?

I’m in the D.C. area…

Thanks!

[e36chris]

hmm, i would think time and the cleaning you're doing is good enough, you just want to make sure when you put hot water down and scrub that you ventilate the car, make sure ur water isnt just sitting there and promoting some deterioration in the carpet. the soap is going to be in the carpet for a while

i think over time the spot will go away, just ventilate and keep at it.

hope it helps

[1erich]

Use water or a wet vac then crank up the heat and put the fans on max at the footwell area. That will speed up drying considerably.

[Addict...Nah Im A Junkie!]

Yeah, hot water and a wet vac sound like a good solution.....but stop adding more cleaning products to it.....

OR

rent a carpet cleaning vac from home depot and really get that carpet sparkly.

[ptack]

Yeah, you should have just gone out and got a carpet cleaner (one that vacuums up the water). That's what you need to do. It's unlikey you did any lasting damage - unless you leave the moisture there. The carpet itself is probably pretty tough, just get all the residue out of the fibers.

[Lester]

Rent or borrow the Bissell Carpet/Upholstry cleaner, it has a hand attachment for upholstry that will work fine. Just keep rinsing and sucking up the spot until all the soap is gone.

[TagMan]

Yeah, no matter what the product, it gets down to using a wet vac of one type or another. Keep wetting it down and vacuuming it out. Stay with it, because eventually the soap you spilled will dilute enough, and then you can dry the carpet with fans or a blow dryer that doesn't get too hot.

Man, you're gonna have some damn clean carpets!

[Lester]

Originally Posted by TagMan

Yeah, no matter what the product, it gets down to using a wet vac of one type or another. Keep wetting it down and vacuuming it out. Stay with it, because eventually the soap you spilled will dilute enough, and then you can dry the carpet with fans or a blow dryer that doesn't get too hot.

Man, you're gonna have some damn clean carpets!

If you don't get the soap out - it will attract dirt like crazy. You might as well get rid of it sooner than later.

[Heinzftw]

RugDoctor!!!

[Mad Dragon]

I'd be more worried about the electronics under the carpet.