Mike Phillips
Active member
- Dec 5, 2022
- 51,004
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Review: Blackfire Carpet and Upholstery by Mike Phillips
Pretty hard to get excited about carpet and upholstery cleaners but this is an important category in the car care appearance category. One of my job duties here at Autogeek is to test or use new products and then write a review to show how the product works as well as (in my case), share how to use it.
That said, here's my review and how-to for the new BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner.
First I don't do mock-up. Don't do it, won't do it. So I needed some really dirty carpet. I have a saying, actually an article, goes like, this,
Run what you brung - Use what you have -Mike Phillips
So I walk out into the Show Car Garage and see the SONAX Van parked in one of the bays. I open the door and found some of the dirtiest grossest carpet I've ever seen.
To practice what I preach, since this is what I have this is what I'm going to use. I removed the carpet and set it on a couple of tables pushed together.
The first thing you do when cleaning carpet and upholstery is to do what is called, DRY EXTRACTION. Or in laymen terms.... get out the vacuum and vacuums up all the loose dirt.
No science to this and not much technique. One tip I would share is that when moving a vacuum over carpet it's easy to move the suction wand over the carpet fast, it kind of makes you feel like you're working fast. Here's the thing, if you move the suction wand too fast over the surface before the dirt can actually be removed the wand has now moved on and the dirt falls back to where it was lifting out of.... so sometimes you can do a better job and go faster by slowing down.
Here's the carpet as clean as you can get it with only dry extraction. Now we're ready to start deep cleaning.
Here's the most worn area where the driver places their feet.
The first step will be to spray on the BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery cleaner directly to the carpet.
The next step is to agitate the cleaner into the carpet using a brush. This tool and technique works but it's very labor intensive and that makes it time-intensive.
Here you can see where I've agitated just one small area.... This works, scrubbing the carpet with the brush agitates the cleaner deep into the carpet to dissolve thingsl like normal dirt build up from the bottom of your shoes as well as things like when the van goes over a bump and the driver spills their Starbucks coffee.
Here's what I show people in my car and boat detailing classes - that is if you already own a simple 8mm free spinning orbital polisher like the Griot's Garage 6" DA or a Porter Cable, or fill-in-the-blank, then get a Cyclo brush or two and turn your paint polisher into a carpet scrubber.
The brush heads that work best are the soft grey brush that has flagged bristles, it simply rotates the best and next would be the Aqua brush head.
Here you can see the brush bristles look blurry in the photo - that's because they are spinning and oscillating and this scrubs like the hand brush only it requires a LOT LESS MUSCLE.
Here's I've scrubbed just one section but after this section I did machine scrub the rest of the carpet.
After machine scrubbing a person could blot out the cleaner and all the dirt and gunk that was loosened but that's actually very in-effective. A better option would be if the carpet can be removed from the vehicle to wash it off with a water hose and strong blast of water from a water sprayer or even a pressure washer to really blast out the loosened dirt. This approach actually works really well but you will get the carpet completely and fully saturated with water from inside out. (be careful not to destroy the carpet with too much power or the wrong spray tip) So then you have to get all the water out and about the only way to do this once the carpet is laid out in your driveway or on some concrete somewhere it so let it dry via evaporation or if possible hang it vertical so the water can exit the carpet via gravity and evaporation.
Hot Water Extractors
Another option is to use a tool that injects hot water and then immediately extracts it out. This does the work of removing all the cleaner and the gunk it has dissolved and loosened while also leaving the carpet a lot dryer via the vacuum extraction benefit. For my classes I show the Mytee Brand hot water extractors, shown below from left to right are the Mytee Lite II 8070 and to the right to it is the Mytee HP60 Spyder.
Here's my buddy John using the Mytee Lite II 8070 to extract dirt out of the carpet.
I have the optional Mytee 8400DX Dry Upholstery Tool on both units and the cool feature about this wand is the see-through plastic top so you can see when the water being extracted is dirty and then when it goes clear showing you that section is clean. Without this feature you're always guessing as there's no way to know if the carpet is actually clean or not since the other wand options are solid stainless steel and you cannot see through them. (obviously)
Here's the results.... the carpet is now so clean I wouldn't eat off of it but I wouldn't feel grossed-out to sit on it.
Ready to go back in for more coffee spilling!
Review and comments...
Like mentioned in the first line of this post, it's hard to get excited about a carpet and upholstery cleaner, most people like the paint polishing aspect of car detailing and I can relate to that. At the same time, you need a safe and effective carpet cleaner to remove stains and ground in dirt that vacuuming alone won't remove. I found the new BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner to work well and without the nasty odor most products in this catoagory have.
The key to getting carpets and upholstery really clean comes from both the agitation aspect and the extraction aspect and that's why I included the tools you see along with the BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner. You always get better results faster when you work by machine. The human hand is simply limited in what it can do.
On Autogeek.com
BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner
BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner 128 oz.
Griots Garage 6 Inch Random Orbital Polisher
Cyclo Brushes
These links to go to 2-packs of the brushes but you can order just one if that's all you want.
2 Pack Cyclo Polisher Aqua Soft Carpet Brush
2 Pack Cyclo Polisher Grey Ultra Soft Upholstery Brush
Hot Water Extractors
Mytee Lite III 8070 Hot Water Carpet Extractor
Mytee HP60 Spyder Hot Water Carpet & Upholstery Extractor
Mytee 8400DX Dry Upholstery Tool
If you're going to work by hand...
Mat & Carpet Scrub Brush
Pretty hard to get excited about carpet and upholstery cleaners but this is an important category in the car care appearance category. One of my job duties here at Autogeek is to test or use new products and then write a review to show how the product works as well as (in my case), share how to use it.
That said, here's my review and how-to for the new BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner.
First I don't do mock-up. Don't do it, won't do it. So I needed some really dirty carpet. I have a saying, actually an article, goes like, this,
Run what you brung - Use what you have -Mike Phillips
So I walk out into the Show Car Garage and see the SONAX Van parked in one of the bays. I open the door and found some of the dirtiest grossest carpet I've ever seen.
To practice what I preach, since this is what I have this is what I'm going to use. I removed the carpet and set it on a couple of tables pushed together.
The first thing you do when cleaning carpet and upholstery is to do what is called, DRY EXTRACTION. Or in laymen terms.... get out the vacuum and vacuums up all the loose dirt.
No science to this and not much technique. One tip I would share is that when moving a vacuum over carpet it's easy to move the suction wand over the carpet fast, it kind of makes you feel like you're working fast. Here's the thing, if you move the suction wand too fast over the surface before the dirt can actually be removed the wand has now moved on and the dirt falls back to where it was lifting out of.... so sometimes you can do a better job and go faster by slowing down.
Here's the carpet as clean as you can get it with only dry extraction. Now we're ready to start deep cleaning.
Here's the most worn area where the driver places their feet.
The first step will be to spray on the BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery cleaner directly to the carpet.
The next step is to agitate the cleaner into the carpet using a brush. This tool and technique works but it's very labor intensive and that makes it time-intensive.
Here you can see where I've agitated just one small area.... This works, scrubbing the carpet with the brush agitates the cleaner deep into the carpet to dissolve thingsl like normal dirt build up from the bottom of your shoes as well as things like when the van goes over a bump and the driver spills their Starbucks coffee.
Here's what I show people in my car and boat detailing classes - that is if you already own a simple 8mm free spinning orbital polisher like the Griot's Garage 6" DA or a Porter Cable, or fill-in-the-blank, then get a Cyclo brush or two and turn your paint polisher into a carpet scrubber.
The brush heads that work best are the soft grey brush that has flagged bristles, it simply rotates the best and next would be the Aqua brush head.
Here you can see the brush bristles look blurry in the photo - that's because they are spinning and oscillating and this scrubs like the hand brush only it requires a LOT LESS MUSCLE.
Here's I've scrubbed just one section but after this section I did machine scrub the rest of the carpet.
After machine scrubbing a person could blot out the cleaner and all the dirt and gunk that was loosened but that's actually very in-effective. A better option would be if the carpet can be removed from the vehicle to wash it off with a water hose and strong blast of water from a water sprayer or even a pressure washer to really blast out the loosened dirt. This approach actually works really well but you will get the carpet completely and fully saturated with water from inside out. (be careful not to destroy the carpet with too much power or the wrong spray tip) So then you have to get all the water out and about the only way to do this once the carpet is laid out in your driveway or on some concrete somewhere it so let it dry via evaporation or if possible hang it vertical so the water can exit the carpet via gravity and evaporation.
Hot Water Extractors
Another option is to use a tool that injects hot water and then immediately extracts it out. This does the work of removing all the cleaner and the gunk it has dissolved and loosened while also leaving the carpet a lot dryer via the vacuum extraction benefit. For my classes I show the Mytee Brand hot water extractors, shown below from left to right are the Mytee Lite II 8070 and to the right to it is the Mytee HP60 Spyder.
Here's my buddy John using the Mytee Lite II 8070 to extract dirt out of the carpet.
I have the optional Mytee 8400DX Dry Upholstery Tool on both units and the cool feature about this wand is the see-through plastic top so you can see when the water being extracted is dirty and then when it goes clear showing you that section is clean. Without this feature you're always guessing as there's no way to know if the carpet is actually clean or not since the other wand options are solid stainless steel and you cannot see through them. (obviously)
Here's the results.... the carpet is now so clean I wouldn't eat off of it but I wouldn't feel grossed-out to sit on it.
Ready to go back in for more coffee spilling!
Review and comments...
Like mentioned in the first line of this post, it's hard to get excited about a carpet and upholstery cleaner, most people like the paint polishing aspect of car detailing and I can relate to that. At the same time, you need a safe and effective carpet cleaner to remove stains and ground in dirt that vacuuming alone won't remove. I found the new BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner to work well and without the nasty odor most products in this catoagory have.
The key to getting carpets and upholstery really clean comes from both the agitation aspect and the extraction aspect and that's why I included the tools you see along with the BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner. You always get better results faster when you work by machine. The human hand is simply limited in what it can do.
On Autogeek.com
BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner
BLACKFIRE Carpet & Upholstery Cleaner 128 oz.
Griots Garage 6 Inch Random Orbital Polisher
Cyclo Brushes
These links to go to 2-packs of the brushes but you can order just one if that's all you want.
2 Pack Cyclo Polisher Aqua Soft Carpet Brush
2 Pack Cyclo Polisher Grey Ultra Soft Upholstery Brush
Hot Water Extractors
Mytee Lite III 8070 Hot Water Carpet Extractor
Mytee HP60 Spyder Hot Water Carpet & Upholstery Extractor
Mytee 8400DX Dry Upholstery Tool
If you're going to work by hand...
Mat & Carpet Scrub Brush
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