Common Stain Remedies to Avoid

Common Remedies to Avoid When Removing Stains

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Common Remedies to Avoid

Dishwasher detergent: Although sometimes suggested for food stains, these detergents are intended for use in closed dishwashers with very hot water. They are so highly alkaline they can irritate your skin if you use them in stain removal. They also may fade colors or damage wool, silk, or nylon fibers.

Hair spray on ball-point ink: Certain hair sprays are effective on ballpoint stains, but they may deposit a gummy residue and perfume that then have to be removed along with the ink. Hair spray also may affect color in some fabrics. Alcohol is a hair spray ingredient that is useful for removal of the oily part of the ball-point stain.

Ironing candle wax: Ironing candle wax between blotting paper will only drive the stain deeper into the fabric. This process is widely used, but it's not recommended because it will make any color from the dye of the candle more permanently set and the wax more inaccessible for the detergent or solvent to reach to carry the stain away.

Milk on washable ink: This doesn't remove the ink and gives you an additional protein stain.

Salt to make dyes colorfast: Today's dyes cannot be increased in colorfastness by soaking in salt water. If bleeding of a particular dye in cotton, rayon, or ramie fabric is decreased with a salt water soak, the effect will not be permanent, When the fabric is wet again, unless there is salt in the solution, the dye will be free to leave the fabric. Salt cannot affect colorfastness of synthetic fiber fabrics or their blends because they are dyed with dyes that have chemical structures not affected by salt.

Shampoo: Clear gel-like shampoos are sometimes suggested for stain removal. While they are usually not harmful to fabrics and may work on light oil stains, laundry detergents are just as effective and less expensive to use. Additionally, colored, opaque; or milky-looking shampoos may contain ingredients that will stain fabrics or foam so much that they are difficult to rinse out.

White vinegar: Vinegar (acetic acid) may weaken cotton, rayon, acetate, triacetate, or silk fibers and may cause color change. If used as a stain removal agent, test on a hidden seam allowance for colorfastness. Vinegar will not help remove or set creases in today's synthetic or permanent press fabrics, although this is a common belief.

Special thanks to Iowa State University for allowing us to reproduce this information.

Reproduced with permission from the Cooperative Extension Service, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, 50011.

Prepared by: Janis Stone,
Textiles and Clothing Specialist,
Iowa State University

Alkalinity Is the Hidden Problem

Several folk remedies share one flaw: they are far more alkaline than laundry products made for fabric. High alkalinity strips some dyes outright, roughens protein fibers such as wool and silk, and burns skin during the prolonged hand contact stain treatment involves — laundry detergents are buffered for fabric and hands in a way dishwasher and heavy cleaning products simply are not. A remedy borrowed from a harsher cleaning job imports that job's chemistry with it.

Remedies That Set Stains

The second family of bad advice is mechanical: hot water on a protein stain cooks it in, rubbing spreads a stain deeper and wider, and the wrong solvent can dissolve a synthetic fabric or drive a dye stain through to the back. The sheet's alternative is unglamorous and effective — blot, classify, test, and use the product class the series specifies for that stain class, at the temperature specified. Boredom, in stain removal, is the sign of a method that works.