Damm those stains (DE.SOLV.IT Universal)

Member Name: chele2002

Product:	DE.SOLV.IT Universal
Date:	15/02/02 (622 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: See op

Disadvantages: See op

Intro
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If you are like me, then you are probably fed up of good clothes going into the bin way before they should do. No not through wear and tear but through every parent's nightmare, stains!! Oh yes, stains and being a parent of 4 children ranging from the ages of nearly 1 years to 7 years old, I can tell you that I have come across quite a few in my time.

* Butter: This normally finds its way into our children's hair, but what is most annoying are the greasy marks it leaves on their clothes.

* Food: Here's the deal, our baby loves her food, and she can't get enough of the stuff but she tends to get a little fussy if she can't show here independence and feed herself, normally by grabbing a hand full of her grub, squashing hand firmly against mouth and dropping what bits didn't reach her mouth before she closed her lips. Lets just say, she has many clothes but a good selection of them have gone from white, pink, lilac etc to having orange, brown, yellow etc stains embedded in them, normally around the neck line but she has been know to christen other parts.

* Chewing gum: There doesn't seem to be many places where you can sit with out finding the contents of someone's gob stuck to your backside and having children in school, I find especially in the summer months they are prone to getting gum stuck to their backsides too, normally from parking their bottoms on the playground.

* Grass: A real pain this can be, I have almost got to the point where I considered buying a whole wardrobe of green clothes, much to the dis-taste of our children.

* Crayon: Kids being kids, love showing their creative side, even our toddler John loves to join in, but unfortunately he has not quite figured out that Mummy wants his creative side on some paper and not on the doors, walls, floor, sofa or his clothes.

* Paint: It's not very often that my kids are let loose with some paint
but on occasions they have dabbled in a splash of colour or two, just a shame that most often than not, they haven't bothered to protect their clothes.

* Make-up: Yes, guilty as charged, but I'm not going down quietly, no I'm taking our oldest daughter with me too. You see, I tend to apply my make-up with my fingers (I can see you all having visions of me putting on my war paint and doing a dance and chanting 'must get ready! I'm in another rush, got ten minutes left before we go out and get sloshed'), which ends out getting rubbed into the nearest fabric near me, the reason for the finger painting is because I no longer have any brushes left, they have some how all disappeared into oblivion. My daughter on the other hand, likes to apply her make-up to any part of her body, and anything else she happens to be near; I call it an extension of her creativity that she likes to share, just not with your clothes and bedding please.

* Vomit: Ewww, not the nicest of substances to clean up at the best of times and even less appealing when you've just come in from a night out, so you leave the stubborn bits to later and just do your best with soapy water to clean up the masses. One problem with vomit if it isn't cleared up as soon as possible, it tends to cling to what ever it has been sprayed over, making it very difficult for warm soapy water to tackle.




What is DE.SOLV.IT Universal?
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DE.SOLV.IT is a stain remover of all known stains, which can be used on most types of surfaces and even as a stain remover to fabrics before pre-washing, which has been tested and validated by FCRA (Fabric Care Research Association).



What types of stains can it remove?
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According to the can, it removes grease, tar, gum, paint, crayon, coffee, make-up, wine, sauces, oil, ink and grass.

As to whether it work
s on all these types of stains, I have yet to find out, but what I can say is yes it does work on the ones I have tried, which include: tomato sauce (removed from the sofa, clothes, and carpet), butter (removed from clothes and wallpaper), ink (removed from clothes, usually school shirts), paints i.e. emulsion paints, glass paints, and paints used in schools (removed from clothes, again usually from school shirts), make-up (removed from carpet *yes, I'm a messy sod, t-towels, towels, clothes and in my daughters case, the bedding) and last but not least crayon (removed from every place imaginable, the floor laminate, and tiled, wallpaper, windows, doors both painted and bare wood, clothing and the sofa.

All attempts have been pretty effective but what I have found is when there is a stain on some fabrics, for example clothes or carpet, I have usually needed to use a 2nd application, not that I am complaining, it did the trick.



What surfaces it can be used of safely:
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DE.SOLV.IT can be used on all hard surfaces, i.e. glass, wood, walls, floors, tiles, on carpets, with the exception of rubber or foam backed and on most fabric and garments, with the exception of leather, suede and silk.



What surfaces it can't be used on:
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It is not recommend for use on leather, suede, silk, but then these types of materials are a little delicate at the best of times, so I would there for recommend a specialist cleaner who deals in the likes of the materials. Nor it is to be used on rubber or foam backed carpets, I suppose that it has undesirable effects, when mixed with rubber or foam.


Applying DE.SOLV.IT to stains:
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1st what you need to do as with all applications and surfaces, is test a small area to make sure that it is compatible with the solution.

Application is reall
y easy and straight forward, say for example you have a stain on your carpet that is quite fresh, so still damp, blot the stain (avoid rubbing as it can cause the stain to spread) with kitchen paper, or anything else that is similar, removing as much of the stain as you can, then spray some DE.SOLV.IT to a tissue or cloth, then repeat blotting the area until any residue is removed, then rinse the area off with warm soap water.

For dried in stains, or stains that have been there for a while, you may find that the 1st application is not enough, so it may be necessary to repeat the above.

The same type of application procedure applies to hard surfaces and other fabrics too.


Applying DE.SOLV.IT to chewing gum:
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We all know what a pain chewing gum is, but with any luck this will do the job.

To use this on chewing gum you 1st need to pierce the gum with a fork, this allows the solution to work into the gum more effectively. Then spray some solution on to a tissue or cloth, then blot, like you would for carpets etc, until all residues is removed, then rinse with warm soapy water, if you find that you are then left with a mark, just repeat as you would for fabrics until satisfied.


Using as a pre-wash:
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If you have a stain on clothes that are safe to be washed in the washing machine, then just spray DE.SOLV.IT to the back of the effected area, leave for 5-10 minutes to allow the solution to work into the area, and then wash as you would normally.


Other bits you may like to know:
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As far as I am aware it only comes in a 100ml spray can, I purchased our from Tesco's and it cost us £1.98, so not bad when you think of what gets thrown away because of stains.



Overall
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I have tested it out on a number of stains accumulated in the past months, mainly wi
th thanks to the younger children and have found it pretty effective, but have on more than one occasion have needed to repeat application, the same for pre-wash too. But because you only need to use it sparingly and not in vast quantities, I don't mind repeating when it has been necessary. Let's put it this way, it has brought new life to our carpet, which once had traces of muddy feet (not guilty) and make-up (guilty), and has saved us from ditching perfectly good clothes, saving us money in the long run.

For just £1.98 it is worth giving it a try, you never know it could even save you from ditching good clothes etc, and if your nice new carpet only has a small area of it stained then also try it but has for a large area of carpet try a carpet shampoo 1st.

Summary: