What could I have done better?

[B&BGaryC]

I cleaned a freight company office today. HWE with 220-240 ATM... Greenhorn wand ten flow, bumped the pressure up to 500 PSI. Used a strong solution of bridgepoint Zone perfect mixed with citrus solve. I used Power-Point in my head-cap jug metered around 4 or 6 gal/hour.

I pre-scrubbed with an adsorbent pad and post padded with cotton. You can still see where the mats were. Is there something I am missing?

And yes, that's my helper in the before pic...

I don't really know what I was thinking with the last two pics. I didn't keep track of my before and afters too well...

Anyway, lemmenowhachathinkin...

 

[Mikey P]

Try pre scrubbing with a Red pad next time and trigger spraying some Encap and 30 vol along with your post padding, but once a carpet is that bad it will never be 100% again.


They should be thrilled with what you did.

 

[packfancjh]

Try some Extreme Clean or Flex boosted.

 

[B&BGaryC]

Mikey, what are these red pads you are always talking about?

You want me to use a cotton bonnet AND peroxide? Or did you mean another 30 volume I am un-aware of...?

Pac fan... I have flex on the truck but I hate using it.... It always fries my lungs.

 

[Mikey P]

3M fiber pads.

Mix some 30 vol (or 40) with your encap and post it in.

POW!

 

[B&BGaryC]

doesn't peroxide eat cotton?

 

[Mikey P]

if you dont rinse it out.

 

[Mikey P]

and don't be leaving peroxide of any vol on non solution died nylons.

Ya hear me?

 

[B&BGaryC]

if you dont rinse it out.

But my bonnets won't be rinsed out until I get back to the shop... that's my point. And yes, I will be careful with the peroxide on nylons.

 

[Al]

What Mikey said!

Mikey schooled me on the Red Pad for pre-scrubbing and it kicks ass on the nasties!

I had to bring out the Red Pad several times this week! Nothing works better for restoration scrubbing.
My favorite "hero maker'' is a real dirty lite colored Berber

I asked Kyle what his favorite carpet to clean is? He gave me the same answer, I was kind of proud of that because some cleaners seem to have trouble with Berbs, clients have brought this up as well after having heard they are tricky to clean. I know most of us think differently but that school of thought is out there.

Wear your Red Pad down on concrete for a minute or two before scrubbing carpets and we only use the Red on older carpets.

 

[Farenheit251]

After you prespray rub your shoe on a couple areas. If it doesn't make a clean spot you need to mix a different or stronger prespray.

The red pad is the one used for scrubbing vct. Keep it lubricated and you will be fine on commercial. I like to run a little old school shampoo through the scrubber.

 

[TimP]

First thing I don't get is why you're using Zone Perfect when you have carpet in that condition. If you're a bridgepoint man you should of at least been using traffic slam or flex, I probably would of pulled out power break myself though and mixed for heavy soil and applied it liberally 1 gal per 100-150 ft. You need to choose the right chemical for the job, and I'm one that leans towards going above what is recommended and let the chemical do the work. Boosting those with some citrus and some H2O2, roto scrubbing with a 175 with at least a white pad and rinsing with an emulsifier (which I think you did) would of done a lot better. Don't worry so much about carpet warranties when the carpet looks like that....the warranty is gone. So you're job is to get it as clean as possible and if the customer is worried about the protector you can sell it to them of course. In my opinion based on what you used I'd say you under cleaned that job. Now if you pulled out the big guns like I said above and got the same result I'd say you did your best so you need to make sure you are using the right tool for the job.

 

[Curtis Pennington]

Wow there is better chems but your procedure was right on....cant clean a shirt you havent washed in 8 years.

 

[Mikey P]

If you think Reds are fun, just wait till you find a carpet worthy of a Black :shock:

We did a back room in a KMart once that NEEDED a black pad to rip off the eighth inch of hard crud.

It's amazing the abuse Olefin loops will take.

 

[Rex Tyus]

Yep, Powerburst(if you are a bridgepoint fan Power Break) and a red pad (I would have used a green, but you are not ready for that). I agree with the others, they should be pleased, that carpet was trashed. In an environment like that it is difficult to completely erase the outline of the mat as the fibers are significantly distorted from abrasion as the wheels roll off and on the mat. It just grinds the sand into the fiber and vacuums (if that place even has one) don't do well on the transition when/if their staff is vacuuming.

 

[Trevor Truitt]

Quicky suggestion:

Freight company suggests to me that there would be aluminum oxide present (from inside the trailers) as well as some type of oil.

I'd suggest trying some type of FSR, like cyclone (?).

 

[Scott S.]

when i run into carpet that is heavily soiled like that i break out the bomb.

Flex boosted with citrus solve, and boost all.

spray it on, dwell 5 min, scrub with 175, light spray again, and extract with power point and bonnet afterwards

 

[steve g]

If you think Reds are fun, just wait till you find a carpet worthy of a Black :shock:

We did a back room in a KMart once that NEEDED a black pad to rip off the eighth inch of hard crud.

It's amazing the abuse Olefin loops will take.

maybe john g needed to try that one to bring him back into reality on his OP method being the shiznizzle over HWE,

B&B I think you did pretty good actually, the only thing I would say is I would have run an olefin specific prespray, like prochems olefin preconditioner, or what I use is prochem renovate, I think they are the same product the first one is just diluted more for what you buy, you need something to break up the oils on carpets like that, and often your standard presprays for rez jobs just aint powerful enough

 

[Jeremy]

I like Ice Blue/Baby Blue burnishing pads for scrubbing/encapping. Stiff enought to shear the crap off the carpet & soft enough not to damage anything. No break in needed.

Any way, for mat lines like you have in the pics Releasit DS & Punch at 6 oz each per gallon & 2-3 oz of 30 volume will work wonders, as will Vac Away's Cyclone VLM & BP Solvent Clean. Whatever you use hit it with a scrubby pad & follow with cotton. Personally I like to OP with the pads & juice above... Works out nice. Oh yeah... Place fans as needed.

 

[rhyde]

how at about a service contract so they get the carpet cleaned next time before it’s that bad

 

[steve frasier]

I agree with the red pad and if you have a cimex cut some little pads out of a big pad to fit the cimex, scrub the crap out of it, you can't hurt it

I would also go with the olefin product line from ProChem, I wouldn't use powerburst, scrup in the pretreat and rinse with the deep clean, you will never get all the dirt out of it with a one time cleaning but can over time with a every 3/4 month cleaning you will

make sure you tell them it is olefin and the enviroment it is installed in because it will look like crap in 3 months no matter what you do to it

 

[B&BGaryC]

Here's why I used zone perfect: I do a monthly greasy restaurant cleaning with GDC. I do two of them a month. I have had the oportunity to try every pre-spray I got, and zone perfect seems to do better than all of them but flex. I don't want to use flex because it burns my lungs, but ZP outperforms Traffic Slam, Procyon and a few others I've tried. My zone perfect is not mixed 1-32 though. I generally mix it 1-16 or more. If I think I need more, I will use White Lightning in my head-cap, but then I have to neutralize it, whereas I don't lose sleep over leaving Power Point in a carpet.

 

[Rex Tyus]

Here's why I used zone perfect: I do a monthly greasy restaurant cleaning with GDC. I do two of them a month. I have had the oportunity to try every pre-spray I got, and zone perfect seems to do better than all of them but flex. I don't want to use flex because it burns my lungs, but ZP outperforms Traffic Slam, Procyon and a few others I've tried. My zone perfect is not mixed 1-32 though. I generally mix it 1-16 or more. If I think I need more, I will use White Lightning in my head-cap, but then I have to neutralize it, whereas I don't lose sleep over leaving Power Point in a carpet.

Why would you worry about neutralizeing the carpet in that environment? That is a myth started by chem manufacturers to sell more acid rinse. There are times when you would want to sour a textile post cleaning. That situation is not one of them.

 

[Scott S.]

my other bomb that you may like is redline prespray from masterblend. cuts like a knife on dirty (less greasy) carpets.
you may like that more its is a powder and has quite a punch.

 

[joey895]

Ok I've used flex and know it kicks butt on the nasties. What I'm wondering is does traffic slam or the prochem olefin product work just as good? They are better dilutions and looking at the msds of each they seem to be much healthier, I know flex is some nasty stuff.

I know extreme clean, powerburst, and powerbreak all work very good but I just prefer liquids. Then again I'll continue using these powders before I go back to flex. I'm just crazy like that.

 

[Brian R]

Ok I've used flex and know it kicks butt on the nasties. What I'm wondering is does traffic slam or the prochem olefin product work just as good? They are better dilutions and looking at the msds of each they seem to be much healthier, I know flex is some nasty stuff.

I know extreme clean, powerburst, and powerbreak all work very good but I just prefer liquids. Then again I'll continue using these powders before I go back to flex. I'm just crazy like that.

Are you talking about Flex "low voc". I don't get much odor from that at all. Is it still killing me? Who knows.
With that said, it doesn't work as good as I would like. Someone said that the formula was changed and maybe that is why.

 

[joey895]

Ok I've used flex and know it kicks butt on the nasties. What I'm wondering is does traffic slam or the prochem olefin product work just as good? They are better dilutions and looking at the msds of each they seem to be much healthier, I know flex is some nasty stuff.

I know extreme clean, powerburst, and powerbreak all work very good but I just prefer liquids. Then again I'll continue using these powders before I go back to flex. I'm just crazy like that.

Are you talking about Flex "low voc". I don't get much odor from that at all. Is it still killing me? Who knows.
With that said, it doesn't work as good as I would like. Someone said that the formula was changed and maybe that is why.

No, I'm in Florida I can still get the regular stuff. So is there any other liquid as strong or stronger than flex. Have you tried traffic slam or prochem olefin preconditioner.

 

[Rex Tyus]

No, I'm in Florida I can still get the regular stuff. So is there any other liquid as strong or stronger than flex. Have you tried traffic slam or prochem olefin preconditioner.

Yes. CASTROL SUPERCLEAN!

 

[Brian R]

As of now I am really just trying what the guys at the supply store says works.
I may have to have some others shipped in.
But hey, I'm never happy.
I just need something that I can spray on and leave and the carpet just gets cleaned magicly. Is that too much to ask??

 

[TimP]

Traffic slam is probably stronger in the bottle than Flex. You can up the dilution ratio with traffic slam and it does pretty good. Even at 1-32 it cleans olefin pretty good but it's probably not as strong RTU. Flex has a 1-8 dilution and is pretty costly in my opinion, and it's probably near the same as traffic slam before dilution. You can clean just as well with powermax though....and it's easier on the lungs. Or even judson O2 if you up the dilution and add the modifier to it so people say anyhow. There is stuff out there that works you just have to know what you're doing. Recognize your need for increased dilutions by diagnosing your level of soil. In addition with scrubbing and use of emulsifier high heat and high flow you can do a lot with out having to use lung killing pre conditioners like powerbreak/powerburst. Although knowing it's out there so that if you by chance do need it you can have it as a last resort.