Mike
Carruthers:
Club
soda - it's supposed to be a great stain remover, however…
Carolyn Forte:
We haven't found that club soda provides any benefit
over plain water. We've done side-by-side tests and it really
hasn't…it's not that it doesn't work but we haven't found that
it works any better than plain water.
Carolyn Forte
of the Good Housekeeping Research Institute, which has just
published a new book called Stain
Rescue, says people think hairspray is good at getting out
ink stains.
And again, it's
not that it doesn't work but what's working in the hairspray
is the alcohol. So for ink stains, ballpoint ink stains that
is, we recommend just sponging on a little rubbing alcohol and
we find that it dissolves the stain and helps get it out.
Carpet stains
can be tough because they sometimes seem to come back after
you think they are gone.
A big reason
carpet stains come back is because they dry and the stain brings
itself back up to the top of the surface. So what you want to
do is after you've removed a carpet stain is, our best advice
is pile on a stack of paper towels and weigh it down with something
heavy like a pot or a vase. The next day the carpet will be
dry and any stain residue will be up in the paper towels and
you can throw it away.
And a general
rule for stains in carpet and upholstery is…
You want to pull
it out; you want to draw it out. It's not easy to get behind
the stain, so you want to blot, blot; blot as much as you can.
If you've got like a wet dry vac or a little hand vac that can
pick up spills, those are great for pulling extra moisture out
of carpets or upholstery.
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- I'm Mike Carruthers and that's Something You Should Know.
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