How to wash off dark carbon/motor oil stains

Goop (smells good) or Permatex (smells awful) hand cleaner will take care of the oil. Make sure the clothes are dry first and don't wet them for a half-hour or so after rubbing it in.

'Don't know about the carbon. That's just rubbed into the fabric. If washing in regular detergent won't do it, I don't know what will -- unless it comes out with the oil.

I use Dawn dish washing detergent on a lot of things. Like getting my hands clean. It works surprisingly well on oil. Try it using an old tooth brush. If you can use it to get crude oil off birds, it ought to work on used motor oil.

Something else to try would be some hydrogen peroxide. It releases monatomic oxygen which ought to combine with the carbon to make CO2. But that will bleach the cloth.oil.

An ultra sonic unit , if you have one, would likely work fairly well.

Dan

You might try soaking in Biz for a while. I've made some things look like brand new.

Timing really helps. 2 tips: The quicker you wash the clothing after the stain, the better. And never put a stained piece of clothing into the dryer, as it can 'set' the stain. Pull the stained clothing out of the washer and see if the stain is gone. If not, don't dry it. Try other stain removers while it's spin-dried.

If you spill latex paint on good clothes, soak the painted area in DNA or isopropyl (weaker) alcohol, then brush with stiff plastic bristle or fine bristle brass/bronze brush to remove the thicker portion. Now wash as usual while still wet with the alcohol.

Things like powdered graphite and sooty dust will blow off with a narrow, OSHA-disapproved tip and high pressure, so try blowing first, preferably BEFORE you wipe it in. OSHA-approved goggles recommended.

Some of the old standards help: borax, washing soda, and fels naptha soap. When I want to whiten my whites, I put half the amount of liquid soap, half a cup of borax, and half a cup of washing soda in the wash. If there's a grease/grass stain on clothes, I rub it with naptha soap before washing.

Newer helps: Orange oil, EasyWash, cleaning enzymes, purple degreaser.

Some spray enzymatic cleaner my sister gave to me is from her MLM herb company, Nature's Sunshine. It took out grease stains which were set in by the dryer when nothing else worked for me, which really and pleasantly surprised me.

If you sign up to get the member price ($40 min order) please use her name: Cheri Jaques. They bombard with email until you unsubscribe, then they don't bother you. The products are great, but $$$$ to me.

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A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

-Robert A. Heinlein

Drt cleaning. Use caeb/choke cleaner - some brakr cleaners work too. If the "dry cleaning" doesn't work the only way to get rid of the stains is a scissors.

Don't you want to caution him to test either of those solvents on a hidden area of the clothes first?

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A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

-Robert A. Heinlein

I've used both on cotton and polyester blends with no problem. Safe on any natural fiber - I might not want to use it on acetate/

That's good to hear. I haven't looked at the MSDSes on those but I heard someone call B12 "acetone" the other day and I didn't buy it. Surprisingly enough, a lawnmower engine will run on half diesel and half gasoline. I stumbled across this on djutube the other day and watched it out of curiosity.

Let's see: Brakleen non-chlorinated has Acetone, Heptane, Methanol, and Toluene. Berryman's B-12 carb cleaner has 2-Butoxyethylene, mixed Xylenes, and n-Propanol. They just don't sound "clothes friendly", y'know? ;)

I'm still extremely dissatisfied with "green" cleaners. They simply don't work at all. What they did to mineral spirits in order to lower the VOCs is just disgusting. "Low odor" and "odorless" work fine, but the tree-hugger approved stuff is just miserable. I had to go buy some real mineral spirits after being unable to use the green shit to clean some oil off painted areas before painting. It also failed miserably when I brought it home and tried to clean oil paint off artist's brushes.

Might not need the scissors for that large hole.

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A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

-Robert A. Heinlein

In a former life I did training and field calibration/support for our online coal analyzers and consequently spent a fair amount of time at mines, prep plants and loadout stations plus the occasional power plant. There's essentially nothing that attacks elemental carbon; and if the clothing has already been washed once it's black from now on.

I turned in a few rental cars that didn't look very pristine after a trip to the mines in E KY; I don't think I ever was on a service call there that it didn't rain on me besides all the rest...what I really, really loved (not) was that we only got access to the beltline after the gob shifts finished their night's work so normally it was 2AM or so before could even start a set of calibration runs (which consisted of placing a set of coal samples of known ash content under the detector head and measuring the response then building a calibration curve)...

We throw a liter of Coca Cola in the washing machine along with usual detergent to clean up Mechanics coveralls that are soiled with grease, diesel fuel etc.