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I purchased a pool that has black stains on the vinyl liner way ABOVE the water line.
I know that these stains have been there for years.
I have scrubbed & scrubbed... tried bleach, two different types of vinyl cleaner & vitamin C. - not one iota of difference.
my m-i-l- suggested that I try " VIM " ( bathroom cleaner)
Anybody know how to clean up old vinyl liners?
Try a magic eraser by Mr. Clean - it really works well.
< raven slaps forehead >
Now, why didn't I think of that..?
thanks marie :)
Marie, is the Mr Clean safe for the pattern on the liner? (I currently have a customer with algae looking iron splothches all over her liner - I almost started a post, but gleaned enough from a previous post that you and smallpooldad had contributed to, to enable me to take a stab at it - thanks!!)
Raven, I don't doubt Marie's advice (anymore, I tried to use logic to refute her this spring, but expertise overruled logic) she really knows this stuff. I'm just worried about liners and abrasives. If the Mr Clean works, great! I usually use some pH up (or baking soda) paste on a green kitchen sponge. The stain you have is probably collected oils and a strong base will break them down, with a little elbow grease.
Waste is right, I would try the magic eraser, but use common sense - don't rub too hard if you see any of the color of the liner come off. It should take off the black marks, I have used it on walls, my pool, and tile. Just use caution - you can also put a little baking soda on the sponge part and maybe it will help it along with not having to press too hard. Let us know how it goes, then we can add it to the "stain arsenal"!
I don't have to worry about losing the pattern from my liner on this one, the stains are so far above the waterline, that there isn't even pattern there; it's just plain blue up there with black stains.
As soon as I can get out of this house & buy another magic-eraser,
( I used the last one up removing the picaso, van gogh, & renoir - crayon drawings from the walls...lol).
.. I'll let you all know how well it did on the stains.
unfortunately all three little darlings have the pox :eek:
( chicken pox even though they were vaccinated for them!), so I'm stuck here for a while. ;)
Oh boy, three with the pox at once!! I guess it will be good just to get out of the house for 5 minutes to go to the store!! I had one child with chicken pox, and two weeks later the other two came down with it - so even though it's hard, at least you will be finished with it in one shot - you know you have to look at the good side of it - ha ha, Best of luck, I'll be wishing good thoughts for you.
The magic eraser did wonders on my liner....It looks brand new!! It takes very little effort for it to work...basically just wiped the crud right off.
well I couldn't get out of the house with the kids full of pox; so I started digging through my cleaning products... ( OMG, just how many bottles of this 'n that or such & such cleaner, does one need anyway? I think I could open a store...lol)
I don't have anymore magic-eraser, but I figured if that product should work than perhaps another product that cleans up crayon, would also work.
I found an unopened bottle of orange clean ( super concentrate) that I think came with a kit of cleaners from the shopping chanel.
it says that it does , well basically everything... too many things to mention ( but then again, what cleaner doesn't..lol).
I looked for ingredients, but could only see three things mentioned: orange oil, limonene, & surfactants.
you are supposed to dilute the stuff, but I did not. ( all the drips did turn the pool water white as soon as it touched the water, so perhaps it doesn't interact with bleach well.)
I used about 2 Fl Oz all together on a scrubbing pool sponge from walmart.
Took about an hour of scrubbing the 14 foot ( by 2 inches) section of liner. and I destroyed the new sponge in the process, but I am happy to report that those old black stains are gone!
Those stains were at least 5 years old, so I'm really happy that they did come off ( with one heck of a lot of elbow grease).
I wonder if regular orange oil would have worked as well...? ( vitamin C did not)
Anyway, I see that orange oil cleaning products work ( or at least this one type did) & if magic-eraser works as well, then I think the answer may be, " Look for products that remove crayon ".
perhaps the next person with black stains above the water line on their vinyl liner can continue this research by testing out another crayon-removing product & see if that works as well.
Thanks everyone for your imput :)