Ceaning painted surfaces?

Manxman_in_exile

What's the best way of cleaning interior wood surfaces and walls? Wood surfaces (eg window sills and frames) are white gloss paint and walls are coloured emulsion.


Elderly (and eccentric) relative has gone into hospital for a few days and we want to spring clean their living room for them. They're a heavy smoker so the surfaces are quite grimy and really need a wash-down.

jimmo

Sugar soap
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/303552

Manxman_in_exile

jimmo wrote: »

Sugar soap
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/303552

Ah well! My father was a painter and decorator (clearly not an inheritable skill!) and I've used sugar soap before.


I thought it might be too potent. But it's ok to use on interior paintwork and won't just strip it off?

jimmo

It certainly didn't damage any of the paintwork whenever I've used it but be prepared to be amazed at the amount of nicotine it will pull out of emulsion in particular and be prepared to wash down the walls more than once.

Le_Kirk

As stated in post #4, there will be a need to do it more than once depending upon the amount of nicotine and other dirt. I wanted to clean part of a wall before I hung new blinds. I use sugar soap and swear by it but this time I ended up swearing at it because all I did was move the dirt (dust/debris rising in the convected air above a radiator) around the wall and I ended up cleaning the whole wall and then repainting!

Manxman_in_exile

Thank you both. Sugar soap is amazing! The woodwork looks as good as new. Even took off ingrained coffee(?) spillage.