We are often called to properties and asked to re-do another carpet cleaners work as the carpets look awful. A common problem is soil visibly wicking up to the surface as the carpet is drying, making the carpet look worse than before it was cleaned! This is caused by soil at the base of the carpet fibres or in/under the backing of the carpet which may not have been removed by vacuuming due to being trapped or compacted in to the carpet or maybe it was a spillage which soaked right through to the backing, but if the carpet cleaner or customer has vacuumed insufficiently or not at all, then wicking is more than likely to occur. Many carpet cleaners assume that because they have a powerful hot water extraction machine, then a dry vacuum is not necessary but they are wrong! More than 3/4 of the soil in a carpet is dry and reacts very well to an extensive, thorough vacuuming using slow, overlapping strokes and paying particular attention to the main walkways and embedded soil as this needs to be removed so as not to cause soil streaking or residual soil wicking to the top as the carpet dries. Following the vacuum, any remaining soil adhered to the fibres needs to be broken away using agitation with a specialist piece of machinery – some cleaning systems have agitation automatically integrated into the cleaning process. Low moisture cleaning further prevents wicking as a carpet which has been over wetted and not extracted well enough will also encourage wicking.
November 25th, 2014
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