Carpet Cleaning
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Payment before service?
After cleaning carpets and upholstery for many years we have seen many questionable practices, we recently have visited a website offering carpet cleaning services in this area, when clicking on the ‘get quote’ button I was asked to make sure my credit card was to hand! Stop! We believe this is the correct procedure to follow:
A customer calls or makes an e mail enquiry -
We respond with by offering to visit and conduct a survey, or by sending an e mail costing (this is free of charge)
If the quotation is acceptable -
We will call in, phone or e mail suggesting some times that may be suitable to our customers. (again free of charge)
On the day we arrive, we will execute our three stage cleaning process and only then, will we present our invoice, we expect no pre-payments or deposits, we are confident that you will be pleased with our standards of work.
We are NCCA (National Carpet Cleaners Association) members and follow a strict code of conduct, giving our customers peace of mind.
UV Damage – Carpets and Rugs
Every week we see serious Ultra Violet or sun bleaching damage to carpets, soft furnishings, rugs, textiles and leather furniture. As people tend to move items of furniture and rugs infrequently, dramatic colour change is seen, very regularly.
But what can you do?
On hot summer days, closing blinds or curtains can help protect your personal items, particularly between 12-3.30 pm, leather furniture dries, carpets and rugs fade, pictures also fade, a consequence can be, brittle carpet and rug fibres, cracked or split leather, damaged soft furnishing fibres can lead to balding. One clever solution is employing a company to fix apply a virtually invisible filter to the inside panes of glass, after rigorous cleaning, these UV filters screen out most of the harmful rays damaging your possessions.
Even in winter months, gradual damage still occurs. As we protect our skin with sun screen, this will be a bigger consideration as the problem of global warming increases as the years roll by.
Bed bugs in Brighton? How to deal with them.
Bed bugs are tiny wingless insects, they feed on the blood of warm blooded animals and humans. These little bloodsuckers and their relatives have evolved as nest parasites. Some live in bird nests or even bat roosts, waiting for the unsuspecting animal to return home. Infant bugs are about the size of a poppy seed, growing up to 10mm in length as adults, they have a fairly flat body with an oval shape, colours range from white to dark brown, if you look closely after the bug has been feeding, you can actually see the victims blood in the insects body.
Bed bug activity - When we are sleeping, they become active, looking for people or animals. They will sip our blood without us realising, whilst they are doing this, small amounts of the bugs saliva will be injected into our skin. Over a period of several weeks exposure to bed bugs, we can become sensitized to the saliva, sometimes leading to allergic responses. The marks on our skin resemble those left behind by fleas and mosquitoes.
Where do they come from? Bed bugs hide in small cracks and crevices, they can be found in furniture, pillows, boxes, luggage. Purchasing used furniture or mattresses can prove an excellent way of these creatures gaining entry into your home. Bed bugs can survive for several weeks without feeding, they can also travel between walls and regularly move from house to house in search of new food sources.
Looking for bed bugs Inspect your furniture or mattress closely, used skins and tiny blood spots can be an indication of infestation at some stage in the furniture’s life. Don’t forget that bed bug larvae can be the same size as a grain of rice.
Our safe and non toxic solutions can eliminate bed bugs, please feel free to contact us for a non obligatory treatment cost.
The importance of the vacuum cleaner.
Much has been written about ‘indoor air quality’, homeowners and carpet cleaners alike sometimes don’t spend enough time using their vacuum cleaner, on rugs, carpets and upholstery.
Vacuuming is the first and MOST important part of the cleaning process, so why would we encourage our customers to use their vacuum cleaner more often? without regular and thorough vacuuming, over the months, large quantities of loose particulate soil gather behind the pile and backing that could actually weigh more than the carpet itself!
As cleaning techicians, this information gives us every reason to give your carpet a detailed and comprehensive vacuum before we start our cleaning process, with over 80% of the soil in your carpet being lose, its well worth doing properly. If a carpet cleaning operator turns up a tries to convince you that a good vacuum isn’t necessary, don’t use him, lose soil will instantly turn into mud/sludge, which will be nearly impossible to remove.
We recommend a quality upright cleaner, we like SEBO vacuum cleaners, a strong vacuum motor in conjunction with an effective beater bar/brush will enable you to remove much of the dry soil in your carpet, its also good exercise!
SEBO Dart Upright Vacuum Cleaner
Stain cleaning using the supermarket spotter.
Ahh….. a stain on your new carpet! However careful we are, sooner or later, a nasty looking stain will be staring back at you, the most common reaction is to purchase a bottle of spotter from the local supermarket.
Damage, colour loss and stains can easily occur on upholstery, rugs and carpets if ‘oxy’ type solutions are incorrectly used, these products contain oxidizing containing sodium percarbonate, hydrogen peroxide and sodium perborate. Medical and cosmetic products containing benzoyl peroxide will also leave you with permanent colour loss and bleach damage.
This type of product should not be used on:
SILK (including rugs containing silk)
Leather
Wool
Wool blend - rugs and carpets
Often people call us after using these products (or a cocktail of solutions) after failing to remove stains, often the instructions on the bottle are ignored, more and more solution is sprayed onto the stain, this will often lead to dye bleed, permanent staining and colour loss ( particularly on upholstery)
We will often need to see the product actually used, and on some occasions be unable to clean the area affected, if the stain had been worked on several weeks or months previous to our visit, the stain damage can be masked by soiling.
The best advice we can offer when using these products would be to always read the data sheets or instructions and use the correct dilution rates without ‘scrubbing’ the fibres.
Carpet cleaning, the five steps.
The days of wheeling an old carpet cleaning machine into a house or office and starting to clean are long gone (although you will find some people still doing this) maximum soil removal will be achieved using the following principles.
Dry Soil Removal.
This is without doubt the most important part of the carpet cleaning process. Dry soil or particulate matter
will increase carpet fibre wear, which actually scratches and abrades fibres. Using the correct vacuum cleaner for individual pile type is also important, a powerful upright cleaner is an excellent choice when vacuuming tufted carpets, but not so good with woolen loop pile, which will felt up, we recommend a tub or cylinder type cleaner. Also make sure you change your vacuum bag when it is 3/4 full, reduced vacuum is seen after this point, which reduces soil removal.
Industry figures suggest 80% of the dry soil is removable by effective dry vacuuming. True carpet cleaning professionals will have powerful equipment able to remove dry soils along with knowledge of how to remove the maximum levels of soils by employing the techniques they have learnt.
The Suspension of Soil.
The solution pie, a combination of the following fundamentals need to followed to achieve the best results.
1- Agitation of the pile
2-Time
3- Temperature
4- Solution action
5- Cleaning with TACT
Grooming and pile setting.
A carpet that has not been groomed in high traffic areas often causes customers to show concern regarding the carpets performance. Grooming after cleaning is particularly important if the carpet has rotary cleaning marks or swirls or straight forward ‘wand’ marks from extraction cleaning. Grooming also helps with the application of protective or odour treatments and more importantly in carpet drying times.
The principle of drying.
With modern carpet cleaning equipment, drying should now be between one and four hours. Good ventilation (open windows and doors) will make a huge difference, airflow helps to realise the moisture in carpet fibres. Other considerations that relate to drying also need to be taken into consideration, for example fibre type and construction and the level of soiling. Air moving equipemt can also speed up drying times, particularly if hot water extraction has been used in the cleaning process. If drying times are of great concern to the customer, low moisture cleaning and dry cleaning methods can also be used.
Dust mites……sleepless nights.
We do have an allergy section on our main website with lots of useful information, although we came across this link that was an clip from the BBC ‘one show’, if you have someone that suffers from Asthma or perhaps a person in you home that is showing signs of Asthma, taking time to look at this clip may be five minutes well spent! Click on the link below.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theoneshow/consumer/2008/09/24/sleep-watch-do-you-have-dustmi.html
This is a very similar sytem to our Dust Mite treatments.
Carpet & Upholstery Cleaning – avoid the cowboys!
There are many companies offering carpet, rug, upholstery and leather cleaning services throughout East Sussex, but how can you make sure that the person invited into your home or office is a honest and capable?
With more than 25 years in the carpet cleaning business, we have seen some innocent people get completely ‘ripped off’ by so called carpet cleaners, some of the problems range from, shrinkage, discolouration, carpet bleaching, damaged property and more.
Here’s a check-list that contains some of the most important information that will help you to stay away from unscrupulous trades people.
Find out if they are members of organisations such as Trading Standards Buy With Confidence Scheme or The N.C.C.A (National Carpet Cleaners Association) these memberships are earned, and not just purchased.
Avoid trades people that advertise with card or leaflets that contain just a mobile number or have no address or website address.
Don’t be taken in by ‘too good to be true’ offers, this is know as ‘bait and switch’ in our industry, once in your home, the operator starts adding on extra charges for; stain treatment, moving furniture, vacuuming and just about any reason they can think of.
Ask for references or the details of people or businesses in your area they have worked for, a true professional will have absolutely no objection to this request.
Do not do business with anyone that asks for money up front!
I would also avoid anyone that simply telephones you, this may seem a little extreme, but you really do not know who you are talking to, often the caller will try to pressure you into making a decision, this is unacceptable.
Try to use a local business with a good reputation rather than a National company or franchise, you will probably get more value for money and also an experienced carpet cleaning tec.
We hope this helps!
Commercial carpet cleaning in Brighton & Hove, Sussex
We have now been operating our Hydramaster Maxx truck mounted carpet cleaning system for five months, we realize that most of our customers are interesed in the end result rather than the equipment used, but this system offers the following advantages:We no longer need to use our customers water, we arrive with our own softened water on board, allowing us to work with no stoppages.
We also will not require electricity when we are extraction cleaning, the Hydramaster generates it’s own power.
Dirty-contaminated water is recovered back to our van, it ends up in our high capacity recovery tank.
No warm air is circulated in the property that we are working in, this will often add to drying times when using an electric portable machine.
Drying times are hugely reduced, this summer we have had carpets dry within 45 minutes. I must add that our system is deep cleaning, not a dry ‘maintenance’ system.
Sheer soil and dirt removal, the Hydramaster system will remove up to TEN TIMES the amount of soil than a portable electric machine.
High working temperature, up to 230 degrees, we usually only work with 160 degrees, fleas and dust mites can’t live at this temperature, which has to be good news. Drying time is also reduced as hot water will evaporate much faster than cool water.
I can sincerely say the results we have achieved in recent months has exceeded our expectations, some of our commercial clients include:
Doctors and dentist surgeries.
Car showrooms
Opticians practices.
Offices, large and small.
Estate agents offices.
In the current economic climate it really makes sense to maintain your carpets, cleaning will increase carpet life expectancy and provide your employees and customers with a clean and fresh environment to vist and work in.
Please have no hesitation in contacting us on 01273 634177 or 01323 520044 if you are interested in finding out more information relating to carpet and upholstery cleaning in a commercial property.
Our commercial carpet cleaning services are offered in the following areas:
Eastbourne Brighton Hove Lewes Portslade Seaford Newhaven Rottingdean
Hastings Battle Bexhill on Sea Heathfield Tunbridge Wells Hailsham Hassocks
Glynde Crowborough Uckfield Mayfield Laughton Ringmer Five Ashes Ripe
Rug materials and Preperation
Rug pile is usually made from wool, which will vary in quality. Early rugs such as Safavid use soft, high quality wool, whilst Caucasian and Turkish rugs often use harsh and fairly coarse wool. More sumptuous rugs are often made of silk and is used in smaller quantities to embelish Turkoman, Caucasian and Turkish rugs.
Cotton is often used for finer detail in Indian and early Safavid rugs, Ghiordes rugs, Ottoman Bursa rugs and Turkoman Saryk rugs. It will mainly be used in its natural form, although in Bursa rug construction cotton is dyed blue. Some Safavid rugs have silver gilt or silver thread wrapped on a silk core, this is also found in later Turkish rugs like Koum Kapu and Hereke.
In nomadic and Turkish rugs, wool is exclusively used for the warp, with none of the fibres dyed, which are spun very tightly, colours are often dark.
Ushak and Transylvanian rugs have adopted an end dip technique, with the warp ends becoming the rug fringes, these are often dyed red and yellow, with the weft being loosely plied wool, although cotton is sometimes used particularly in Caucasian rug creation.
Weft areas are usually dyed in Turkish rug construction, with red being the dominant colour. Early Safavid rugs use tightly spun silk warp with the weft loosely spun in silk. Indian and Persian warps that were made of silk were eventually replaced by mill spun warps made from cotton.
Later Indian rugs were often coarse using jute as the weft material, although generally we have seen an increase in the use of cotton, which is often dyed, but not in the manufacture of rugs like Herez, Tabriz and Kashan, silk is always used as a foundation. Hamadam town rugs, which are also coarse will use a home spun cotton.