Foo - Carpet covered in liquid Tide, HELP!

So I was doing a load of laundry earlier, and somehow, during the spin cycle, the washer managed to gyrate enough to make the huge, brand new bottle of liquid laundry detergent on the dryer fall over and break. Most of the 1/2 bottle of detergent that gushed out stayed on the linoleum, so I was able to clean that up fairly easily, but there is an area of carpet about 4 inches x 16 inches that's completely soaked with goop. Advice, please? We don't have a wet/dry vac, and I don't know anyone that has one I could borrow.

I'm mildly amused at the irony of trying to clean up something that makes other things clean...:rolleyes:

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=1974943

This is about the only option I can think of.

Looks like you are going to have a clean spot on your carpet :D

TAke a towel and soak up as much as you can of the detergent.

Fill a spray bottle up with water only. Spray on to the area to make the soap more liquified and keep extracting water with a towel and wringing it out. :o

The detergent won't hurt your carpet. However, too much of a concentration of residue froma deterent will collect dirt off your shoes. Like washing clothes the rinse cycle is too remove the detergent before drying.

Thanks for the link, Tom... I might just have to break down and get one of those, because while I'd be willing to soak with towels all day, it literally would take ALL DAY...

On the plus side, the apartment smells springtime FRESH! :p

Looks like you are going to have a clean spot on your carpet :D

:roflmao:

The detergent won't hurt your carpet. However, too much of a concentration of residue froma deterent will collect dirt off your shoes. Like washing clothes the rinse cycle is too remove the detergent before drying.

I'm Asian, I don't wear shoes indoors... but the idea of having sticky feet doesn't appeal either. Thanks for the advice! :)

Before you start with the towels, you could probably scrape up the excess (with a dustpan, squeegee, or something with a hard edge). You might be able to use kitty litter (or, similarly, the stuff mechanics use to clean up oil/gas spills) to soak up a lot of it after that.

Maybe rent a carpet cleaning machine?

That happened to me once, the one and only time I'd ever bought one of those monster bottles of Tide, the kind with a spigot? The nearly-new bottle cracked open when it fell and I had almost 2 gallons of Tide on my carpet...right in the main walkway between my front door and the kitchen.

Luckily it was base housing, the carpet was old, and I was moving in less than a month. After a couple rounds of soaking it up with a towel, I put a runner over it and called it good.

if you have white carpeting, wait till the detergent dries, then buy about 200 bottles of Liquid Paper and cover over it.

Maybe rent a carpet cleaning machine?


That's what I would do, you can rent one for 15 bucks at Walmart.

Definitely carpet cleaning machine, a shop vac won't do it cause you need something to disperse the soap and suck it out.

Your only alternative is to get down on your hands and knees and do it yourself.

Or if the carpet's in an out of the way place, just cut the **** out and replace a tile of it.

Hey all, we got most of it up with a few rounds of the shop vac with extra water to thin out the detergent in the carpet.

Thanks for the suggestions, the serious, and well, not so serious. ;)

Actually, this thread hadn't really devolved into non-serious suggestions as of yet.

Though if you're looking for one, I'm sure for a modest fee, your local science laboratory would be willing to develop a strain of soap-eating bacteria that you could let loose in your carpet.

I'm sure it wouldn't even develop a taste for human flesh for at least a few years.

Actually, this thread hadn't really devolved into non-serious suggestions as of yet.

Hey, don't blame me, I gave it my best shot! ;)

Hey, don't blame me, I gave it my best shot! ;)Oops. Heh. Okay, it hadn't completely devolved into non-serious suggestions. :p