Please help. not A :(

MrTube

MrTube

Well-known member
Hi all,

We recently bought our first house and it has been a rough ride tho I think things are getting better.

Last night my wife accidentally broke a "drinking bird" on our kitchen floor. See link : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drinking_bird

The floor is cheap linoleum however we do not have ANY money to even think about replacing it. The liquid evaporated fast leaving behind a red dye we cannot get off of the linoleum.

Any ideas? The wife is away until Monday and i'd love to fix it before she comes back as she feels really bad.

So far I have tried the following cleaners, bar keepers friend, tylex, fantastic and rubbing alcohol.

:(:confused:
 
Wow, you really are a traditionalist. A drinking bird? For real?
Sounds like the blood from the dead drinking bird has gone into the pores of the vinyl floor. It evaporates fast because the bird has a high blood alcohol level from drinking so much. You'll need to put a rug over the stain and get more drinking birds, but I'm not sure where you even get them anymore.:D
 
The dye is likely some cheap organic, like eosin or meth blue. You will never remove the dye molecules that have diffused into the floor, however most organic dyes can be neutralized (to colorless or white) by oxidation. I'd try hydrogen peroxide. It may take many hours of application with a soaked paper towel and plastic cover, changed every 15 min. or so. I have no idea as to what the effect will be on the base color in pattern in the floor.

You could also try other oxidant type stain removers, like "Tech-" sold at you friendly china outlet- Ace. Oxy-clean is another one. Again, it will take prolonged soak time to diffuse the oxidant into the floor, with the effect on the base unknown.
 
If you can't get the stain out, then don't worry about it and just think of it as a friendly reminder of moving into your first house. :)
 
On second thought, you better get that stain out, because if your wife is like most, she'll use that as an excuse to remodel the kitchen, and before the year is out you'll be installing a parquet floor! :D
 
What ever you use, test it in a small spot. You might put you selected cleaner on a sponge and set the cleaner side down to keep the spot wet.

have you emailed Armstrong or similiar flooring companies to see what they recommend.

Clem
 
Depending on the size of the stain, you might be able to patch it with a piece from under an appliance.
 
The liquid in those is usually methylene chloride, the (most active) ingredient in old fashioned-paint strippers (meaning it may not be in the available ones unless it says Aircraft stripper or the like) that can diffuse through most rubber gloves and burn your skin but good.

If the spill caused no other damage to the floor, meaning that it did not soften or melt, you could try the appropriate paint stripper in a small area to see if you can redissolve the dye and remove it by absorption into paper towels or cotton cloth or to even drive it further through the floor.

The stuff is nasty and not good to breathe so have good ventilation if you decide to mess with it.

Personally I would try isopropyl alcohol, ethanol, and then methanol in that order first to try to redissolve it before methylene chloride.
 
txmerlin said:
Depending on the size of the stain, you might be able to patch it with a piece from under an appliance.
Click to expand...

You beat me to it. I had an issue like that in college, dog chewed a 2 foot section in the center of the floor. We patched it with a piece we cut from under the refridgerator. Depends on if the patch would look worse than the stain though.
 
thank you for all of the replies, except for sonny30coupe... I feel your response was uncalled for and rude.

I asked here on Fordbarn because I know many people here and know they have a lot of experience with a wide variety of things and often have unique ideas that work. I consider most of Fordbarn to be good friends even tho only via text most of the time.

Most members here don't post a response simply to upset someone or start a fight.

I apologize if my post actually upset people. It was not my intent.


d.j. moordigian, no, have not had time to work on the A for a while :(.
 
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congrats on buying your first home. Its a good feeling. years from now you and your wife will be laughing about that stain on the floor.
 
linoleum or vinyl flooring . 10" squares or a rolled sheet ? ah hell just give the woman a new floor .
really though you should choose the cabinet style first then find a nice 18" tile to go with the wood finish . 1/8" grout line and seal it.
always bite off more than you can chew.
 
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