INK Stain

mrdoran

Hello people I know this is not really the right forum, but I moved a printer in my home a couple of days ago and have spilt back printer ink on our carpet could anyone tell me how to remove it, the pile on the carpet is quite thick, many thanks to you for your:A help.

Cricri

What fabric/colour is the carpet? If it's a white carpet, you could bleach it (or make more stains to simulate a cowskin pattern ).
Check this link:
http://housekeeping.about.com/od/stainremoval/a/inkstains.htm

"If a permanent ink stain happens on a fabric or pattern that cannot be bleached, it will be difficult to impossible to remove. You can try and you might get lucky, but don’t hold you’re breath for too long.", hence me suggesting the cow pattern. Works on yellow carpet to get leopard skin pattern as well :S

*EDIT* Found another good page with more info:
http://www.howtoremovecarpetstains.com/
Got to love the website name...

mrdoran

The colour is dark maroon, we think it's wool.

Cricri

A lot of fibres that look like wool are actually synthetic, which are easier to clean (because you can use "harder" stuff on it). There should be a tag telling you it it's wool, polyester, polypropylene, or something else.

According to the second link:
"First of all, don't pour rubbing alcohol on your carpet. Apply it to a white cotton cloth and dab the stain carefully, so you don't spread the ink. Suck it out after a few minutes using a shop-vac, or, if you use a cloth, blot carefully. Don't rub! Repeat the process until you remove the stains from the carpet, or until you get no more transfer to the cloth. In the latter case it may not be possible to remove the stain completely, although you can try a commercial cleaning solvent."

So try alcohol and do it quick!

"carpet ink stains will come out more easily if you catch them quickly."

Rinse with water when finished.

"When you remove ink stains from carpet, or any other stains, using a solvent other than water, be sure to rinse the area and extract the water. Again, vacuuming out the water is quicker, and less likely to damage your carpet, but you can use a clean white cloth to blot the moisture out also. Rinse, extract, repeat."

And dry:

"Finally, dry the area quickly. There may still be some ink hiding deep in the fibers. Quick drying prevents this remaining ink from wicking up to he surface of the carpet where it can become visible again. Paper towels work well to get the moisture out, and a fan left blowing on the area will complete the process."

Enterprise_1701C

Good way to tell if your carpet has any wool in it - rub a baloon on it for a short while and then see if it will stick to the wall or ceiling, if it does it contains at least some wool!! (spend ages playing like this when I was a kid!)