Extreme Floor Mat Makeover - How to machine scrub floor mats to remove stains

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Extreme Floor Mat Makeover - How to machine scrub floor mats to remove stains


Recently traded the Golden Eagle in for an INFINITI QX30.


Review: PBL Paint Coating & Surface Coating - 2017 IFINITI QX30 - Magnetic Red


My wife Stacy is a tick on the OCD side about an immaculately detailed interior. Me? Not so much.

To protect the factory carpet mats she ordered the factory rubber mats. When they arrived they were HORRIBLY stained with some kind of white stuff on them. We called the Fort Meyers dealership, (the nearest dealership that had them in stock), and shared a picture of the appearance of the mats brand new out of the packaging and the kind IFINITI parts department staff immediately said he would send is a replacement set AND would personally inspect the new replacement set to make sure they looked right. Called us back and said all the QX30 mats had this white staining defect.

Bummer man. :dunno:


So, the detailer inside of me took this on as a make-or-break situation because Stacy wanted factory mats.


Here's how they looked from the dealership.

See it?

And whatever it is, a little spit and my finger doesn't rub it off.

The best way I can explain it is whatever "it" is - it's stained-INTO and impact ONTO the rubber.

Not pretty....

Spray spray spray...

Machine scrub scrub scrub....

Note how I go up on edge to get the bristles INTO the sub-surface channels?

Note how I go up on edge to get the bristles INTO the sub-surface channels?

I also worked a brush into the tight areas really well...

No pictures

Sorry, no pictures of the,

1. Rinsing clean.
2. Blow drying with a MetroVac Sidekick.
3. Applying BLACKFIRE Multi-Surface Dressing and working in with Horse Hair Brush.
4. Wiping excess off and out of channel areas with Cobra 530 Microfiber Towel - the fluffy side.

After Stacy did the drying and dressing aspect I then air-blasted each mat using the Tornador Black Air Blow Out Gun.

BOOM!

Now they look right and the look tight!

Here's most of what we used... the Carrand brush for for hand scrubbing and the Horse Hair brush was for working the Multi-Surface Dressing

The BLACKFIRE Multi-Surfaced Dressing Concentrate is WATER BASED. Here I've poured some of the concentrate into a measuring cup of water and then mixed it up to show it stays in emulsion. Another way of saying that is it does NOT separate out.

So much less slippery or slick than a solvent or oil based dressing.

The mats came out great. Not perfect but we can live with them. They look GREAT in the car and the carpet mats are protected.

Warning: Use a vinyl/rubber dressing on floor mats at your own risk. The cleaning process removed about 97 percent of the white staining appearance and the dressing tool the results over the top. My thoughts are moving into the future, secondary and thirdary cleaning will completely fix the staining issues.




On Autogeek.com



BLACKFIRE Mat Cleaner & Protectant 32 oz.

BLACKFIRE Multi-Surface Dressing Concentrate 32 oz

Carrand Deluxe Interior Brush

Natural Horse Hair Interior Upholstery Brush

FLEX PE-150 Cordless Rotary Polisher

Heavy-Duty DA Carpet Brush – Long Bristles

Rotary 4 ¾ inch Flexible Backing Plate

Cobra Supreme 530 Microfiber Towel, 16 x 16 inches

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Continued....


Here's the final results after re-installing into car.


Driver's side front

Close-up

Passenger side front

Close-up

Passenger side rear

 

[Thomkirby]

Those were disgusting when you started. You need to talk to the owner to take better care of those mats! :xyxthumbs:

 

[Bruno Soares]

Looks brand new!

How bad was the splatter when doing this? The pictures make it seem like it was pretty clean but a brush like that with that amount of liquid on a semi-hard surface makes me think there'd be a lot of splatter.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Looks brand new!

Yeah... they came out nice but I also scrubbed the heck out of them.

How bad was the splatter when doing this?

The pictures make it seem like it was pretty clean but a brush like that with that amount of liquid on a semi-hard surface makes me think there'd be a lot of splatter.

Not to bad actually. I was wearing my work uniform so I didn't care if I got dirty. I ran the PE14 on the 1 speed setting - that's 900 RPM.

I did the work at the end of the bay by the garage door and rinsed the mats off in the utility sink down the hall.

I would have much rather take replacement but I think INFINITI vendor for their mats must have made them on a Monday?


I'll send the guy we worked with the link to this thread. He/They can do with the info what they will.

 

[Bruno Soares]

Cool. I guess speed 1 is why it didn’t splatter as bad as I was imagining it.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Cool. I guess speed 1 is why it didn’t splatter as bad as I was imagining it.

I started out feathering the trigger but then went ahead and locked the speed trigger in place on the 1 speed setting and it wasn't any worse than feathering the trigger.

If it were not for the rotary power I don't think I could have saved these mats. Not sure what caused the weird staining but my guess is something to do with the injection molding process?

 

[Bruno Soares]

I started out feathering the trigger but then went ahead and locked the speed trigger in place on the 1 speed setting and it wasn't any worse than feathering the trigger.

If it were not for the rotary power I don't think I could have saved these mats. Not sure what caused the weird staining but my guess is something to do with the injection molding process?

Definitely some issue with the molding process. Maybe they messed up the mix of products and it ended up that way. Hopefully the ones you fixed will remain that way and not turn white again with time.

Did they just give you the money back and said keep them?

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

Definitely some issue with the molding process. Maybe they messed up the mix of products and it ended up that way. Hopefully the ones you fixed will remain that way and not turn white again with time.

Cofidence is high we fixed them. They look good. Meant to take a picture last night but car was parked a ways from our house.

Did they just give you the money back and said keep them?

I think so, it was a fine with us. They actually offered to send us another set for free but it had the same problem.


I'll try to get some pictures of the mats back in the car and also the interior after using the complete PBL line on the leather.

 

[JKDesign]

Nice work and excellent write-up as always, Mike! You are the master!! And the white staining is the Release Agent in the rubber- it comes to the surface as the liquified rubber cools off in the mold during the manufacturing process. This is the reason that we have to scrub new raw bumper covers with an abrasive chemical agent and then bake them prior to painting them here in the collision industry. If we don't do that, the release agents come back to the surface (underneath the paint) in the painting process, and eventually the new paint will delaminate down the road.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

And the white staining is the Release Agent in the rubber- it comes to the surface as the liquefied rubber cools off in the mold during the manufacturing process.

Hey thanks for sharing this info - I figured it was something like you describe.

I've sent the link to this thread to IFINITI - maybe it will help them moving forward to deal with this issue.


:dblthumb2:

 

[Bruno Soares]

Nice work and excellent write-up as always, Mike! You are the master!! And the white staining is the Release Agent in the rubber- it comes to the surface as the liquified rubber cools off in the mold during the manufacturing process. This is the reason that we have to scrub new raw bumper covers with an abrasive chemical agent and then bake them prior to painting them here in the collision industry. If we don't do that, the release agents come back to the surface (underneath the paint) in the painting process, and eventually the new paint will delaminate down the road.

So do you think a wipe down with mineral spirits or something like Tarminator could have removed all that white stuff and make it easier to restore the black look? I know those work great on new tires to remove the release agent left behind as well as the lube they use to mount the tire.

 

[Dr Oldz]

I’m sure they cost a pretty penny and shouldn’t have looked like that, Mike.

Seems to be a mold release agent.

I had a customer purchase a rubber truck bed mat that had a sillier substance on it. BLACKFIRE wax remover worked really well for cleaning it.

I seriously need to get some of those brushes. Looks so much easier to clean with a machine than hand scrubbing.

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

:bump:


Just added some re-installation pics to the first post...


Passenger side front

Passenger side rear

 

[JKDesign]

So do you think a wipe down with mineral spirits or something like Tarminator could have removed all that white stuff and make it easier to restore the black look? I know those work great on new tires to remove the release agent left behind as well as the lube they use to mount the tire.

Would have to do a test spot- rubber mats are not vulcanized like tires. Tires can take heavy doses of lacquer thinner without problem

 

[Mike PhillipsMike Phillips is verified member.]

:bump:

Had the car down here over the weekend and took a couple of pictures showing the mats installed.

See first post of this thread.


Driver's side front

Close-up

 

[Belo]

This is like one of those memes where you start out by saying, You know you have the detailing disease when... haha.

I've never machine scrubbed mats, and found that mckees floormat rejuvenator after a hose and wheel brush scrub did a nice job. But they've never looked as good as those!