The Vine: May 14, 2007 #4
Hi Sars,
I’m hoping you or the readers can help me salvage a t-shirt that I like very much but seem to have contaminated. I wore it to work and sweated in it, and now I wash it and it seems fine and not smelly, but when I wear it, the minute I start warming it up a bit it “activates” and starts emitting the stinky. I’ve washed it a bunch of times with no luck. Any ideas? (It’s an out-of-print Glarkware shirt, so you see how badly I want to save it.)
Thank you,
Not Normally a Stinky Girl
Dear Stinky,
This problem suggests to me that whatever method you’re using currently to launder the shirt isn’t killing the bacteria that cause sweat to smell, which probably means that either you should switch to the hot cycle for both washing and drying, or you need to shoot the pits with OxyClean or a similar substance (or treat them with white vinegar).
Readers?
Tags: Ask The Readers health and beauty
I’ve had good luck de-stinking linens and clothing using Nature’s Miracle. It’s a pet odor/stain remover you can buy at PetSmart. I add 1-2 cups to a large washload on the hot or warm cycle.
Be cautious using it on color fabrics. Since it’s a stain remover, it may discolor fabric if you use it in the concentrated form.
Give Borax a try. It’s essentially a detergent booster. You can buy a huge box at Target or your grocery store for about $2, and it works on all sorts of persistent problems. We dump a bunch in with each load of cloth diapers for our son and they come out smelling clean, and that’s a pretty good test. It also gets the smell of cat urine out enough that a cat won’t keep marking the same item, which is no small feat. It is unscented, safe on colors, and is more or less a wonder product. I hope it works for you!
Stick it in the freezer for a few hours, then wash. The freezing will kill whatever bacteria are lingering there.
You can also try vodka, the cheaper the better. I used to work for an opera co., the wardrobe dept. went through gallons of it to keep the stink out of elaborate costumes worn under stage lights. Ya just spray it on.
How about cutting out the artwork, iron it on some heat n’ bond and then iron onto a new t-shirt?
I add Febreze directly to the washing machine when I’m adding soap; I just pour some from my spray bottle in there and let ‘er go. Seems to work well.
Like meghan, borax is my gross-laundry miracle of choice.
Elaborating on mizlizzy’s suggestion, you might try straight alcohol. We use ethanol, the alcohol found in liquor, to sterilize surfaces in the lab. Isopropyl, rubbing alcohol, might do the trick as well, and is probably cheaper than booze.
Adding about a cup of white vinegar to the wash works too.
White vinegar to the whole wash or just spray directly on the offending areas? Seriously, I’ve been battling this for years, (clean, laundered shirts smelling like I’d been at the gym when I’d only been in the office for a few hours) and ProSolve sprayed directly on the underarm areas cured the problem. Amazingly so. (Oh, and I shower and wash properly every morning too. I could not, for the life of me, figure out what the problem was. Bacteria, you say?)
However, ProSolve changed their formula (new and improved, don’t’cha know?) and it doesn’t work at all any more. I’m going through every stain remover on the market trying to solve this. So, seriously. White vinegar in the whole wash or spray directly on the spots. And, Borax you say? Okay then. I’m game beyond belief.
I live in a tropical country where clothes get hung to dry in the shade, resulting in the exact same problem: a charming “cake” of BO that gets warmed up when you wear it. I reccomend washing in cold cold cold water and then drying in sunlight.
I forgot about vinegar! It makes a great fabric softener, too, and your clothes don’t smell like it after. Promise.
If you’re using a machine that has a separate ‘softener’ loading area, put 1/2 cup in there. Otherwise, toss it in before the rinse. We buy a gallon container and put it in with most loads.
I’ve never had luck with freezing alone (this was on shoes). Freezing can help, but bacteria are hardy little buggers and can survive -80oC happily, which is much, much colder than the household freezer–granted, we store them in glycerol too (I’ve worked in a variety of microbiology labs). I’d say use freezing as part of a larger regimen, but vinegar or Borax is more likely to help.
Hey, I’m the one that wrote in. Thanks for all your suggestions. I’m going to give the vinegar and Borax a try and see what happens.
Wondering if you could get a bit more specific on the Borax getting cat urine out. I’ve got a stretch in front of the fire place where Oliver decided to register a complaint about the dog moving in. Now that summer’s setting in here in the South, it’s getting awful. What part Borax to what part water and should I soak? Spray? Use in a steam cleaner?
Please and thank you.
I had a similar problem where someone spilled a glass of milk on the carpet right beside the radiator. Vinegar did the trick.
Re: borax, I usually use it as a laundry booster in the wash. So, I’m not sure about how to use it to clean surfaces. I suggest you pick up a box (it’s less than $3 for a huge one, so it doesn’t break the bank) and see if the label has suggestions. You might find some online as well, it’s a very popular product in natural cleaning circles.
I also got a question emailed to me about vinegar in a Downy ball. I’ve never used one (totally allergic to fabric softener), but it seems like it would work, in theory, since you want it to release at the same time. However, I would Google that as well, there are lots of books and websites about cleaning routines involving only white vinegar and baking soda and water, and I’m sure they can help.
You would think with all of this advice that I would have a clean house, but alas…
For the cat-pee stank: Try spraying the area with baking soda & water. Pee is acidic & baking soda is alkalai, and they neutralize each other. This works great with fresh pee, but may take more than one spritzing to have any effect on old pee. Good luck!
White vinegar and baking soda will remove almost any stain or smell. For smells, I generally run the hot water into the washer and then add about two cups of white vinegar. Husband’s undershirts are stink-free and generally whiter than with regular detergent plus OxyClean. If it’s really bad and comes back after the first vinegar treatment, try soaking in a mix of vinegar and water.
Hydrogen peroxide is also a great laundry stain remover. My mother’s altar guild use it alot.
And cheap pump hairspray is fab for getting ink stains out. Place the garment on a towel (so the stain doesn’t soak through) and then spray liberally with White Rain or whatever (pump not aerosol) and dab. Worked a miracle on shirts that I washed with a pen.
I love Nature’s Miracle for all things cat urine- and vomit-related. I’m wary of hot washes (especially with irreplaceable cotton clothing) unless you always wash on hot. Cotton shrinks like swimsuit coverage over the course of the 20th century.
I’ve had some luck with 1/4 cup hydrogen peroxide (the kind you get for cuts and scrapes at the drugstore) put in with the wash water. Add the peroxide and detergent to the washer as it fills with water, and then add the clothes and you’re good to go. I’ve never had a problem with colours running, but you may want to test the dilute solution on a hidden area first. By the way, this is the same thing as the natural no-chlorine bleaches they sell in the environmentally friendly cleaners section at the store!