How to Remove Tough Stains at Home?

Is the red wine stain on your favorite dress worrying you? I am sure stains are tough for all our readers alike! No matter how careful we try not to spoil our dress during our daily life, situations do get messy. Occasional stains then and now are quite inevitable be it from your hot soup, muddy roads, or stain after dressing your car at home. Then there’s the worry that involving the dry cleaner for your favorite dress might spoil the dress in itself. Well, you can challenge the tough stains right from home, while doing the job better than a dry cleaner! Trust me, it is pure simple chemistry.

How to deal with different types of stains?

1.    Organic Stains

These tough stains are those that arise from living organisms like plants and thinks like red wine, blood, etc. The foremost way to treat standard organic stains is hot water and a bleach alternative (Bleach alternatives are nothing but sodium percarbonate or SPC). SPC is best effective when used in its purest form and is the main ingredient in Oxicleaners.

Try avoiding the conventional chlorine bleach at all costs, said because removing strains isn’t always about whitening. When your white dresses are being fabricated, they undergo treatment with agents better known as optical whiteners or brighteners. And if you use chlorine bleach on them, it not only removes these optical whiteners from them giving a dull off-white look, it also damages the fiber quality while being harmful to your skin.

The best way to treat an organic stain would be to start with a towel on the stained surface. Next,

• Add a small amount of SPC, about 1/2 capful to a bath of hot water and stir the solution to completely dissolve.
• Then, dip the stained area of the cloth with the SPC and hot water solution.
• Gently, rub the towel on top the garment. You can also prefer using a safe fabric stain brush for this step.
• Once the pre-treatment is complete, you can wash off the cloth normally in the washing machine or bucket wash with other garments.

NOTE: If in doubt, you can also add another cap of SPC directly into the washing machine inlet during the wash process.

2.    Inorganic Stains

Inorganic stains are those caused by artificial materials such as automobile grease, ink, and other solvents. Most of these inorganic stains can be best removed with treatment by solvents, the best of them being alcohol or specifically, isopropyl alcohol. But there are other alternatives too such as plain vodka. Use a spray bottle to apply on to the stained area so that the region is blotted with alcohol. Finally, give a normal wash to the cloth, with some SPC added to the machine if you prefer.

3.    Wool & Silk Garments’ Stains

In comparison to other types of garments, wool and silk are the most delicate in nature so the direct application of SPC or scrubbing with a stain-removal brush will only worsen the fabric. So, for wool and silk garments, prefer to pre-soak them for a short duration in the water with your stain solution before giving a normal wash. Also, remember to add these garments in a tightly sealed washing bag before placing it in the washing machine. Once inside the washing machine, you may add half a cap of SPC to the machine since such low concentrations with minimal direct contact won’t be harmful to the fabric.

Stain Removal Tips

Whatever be the stain or fabric type and corresponding removal technique you are using; you shouldn’t expect a 100% stain clearing as you are only scrubbing it. I would say an 80% clearer or stain reduction is good to start with and let the machine wash take care of the rest. As discussed, lukewarm water with the express setting on your machine would be able to suffice for your garment stains. In addition, you can add extra effort with SPC in the inlet tray of your wash machine, however, it is totally up to your choice to add or not.

PRO-TIP:Consider being active with any stain. The lesser time you take to deal with a stain, the better! Leaving them unattended only makes the job difficult later. However, there are ways to remove tough old stains out of your garments.

Also, it is not absolutely necessary that one stain removal technique is linked with only stain type. If you haven’t observed a good outcome with one stain removal technique, feel free to try at least two more removal methods and you would be successful in a 100% stain removal for sure. Taking, for example, a fountain pen ink may not be removed in one stage but in the second step with a final machine wash, you should be able to clear out the stain.

With the discussed tips and techniques, hopefully, you are able to bring down your tough stain marks to a greater extent. Remember, fabric care is best done from the comfort of your home.

With that being said, Dhobi G is a go-to help for anything related to laundry. You may browse many more similar tips at https://blog.dhobig.com/. Visit Dhobi G at www.dhobig.com. Make sure to check them out on Facebook as well at https://www.facebook.com/DhobiGOnline/.