Eliminating Cigarette Smell in a House?

[Cindy]

Any tips, hints or products someone could recommend to remove the smell of cigarette smoke from the home of ex-heavy smokers?

Thanks!

Cindy

[PipeDown]

Assuming no furniture, Try washing all the hard surfaces and shampooing the rug first, then wash or change the curtains, if it still smells, air out for a week then paint if all else fails. It will eventually fade but that could take months.

[Doug Kanter]

You didn't mention whether you were talking about carpets, or just hard surfaces. If carpets, I'd hire a professional service to clean them. They can take a while to dry, so it's best done when the heat's running regularly, or when you can open the windows on a dry day.

For hard surfaces, you may have to do some scrubbing. Smoke sticks to walls, and seems to become almost resinous. A neighbor of mine moved into a house previously owned by a smoker, and before he could get paint to adhere correctly, he had to scrub the hell out of the walls. At the time, there was a product called TSP, made for this type of thing. It was high in phosphates, which are now banned in some (maybe all?) states. If I recall, some people in this newsgroup have commented that the product might not be as effective as it used to be.

[bambam]

Get rid of everything "soft' that you can. Carpets, drapes, etc. If the carpet is too good to tear out, then have it professionally wet cleaned.

Wash walls and flat ceilings with tsp and repaint. Consider using a steamer to loosen up caked on nicotine.

Repaint textured ceilings.

Ken

[hallerb]

Toss all the soft stuff including carpeting etc, scrub everything. PAINT EVERYTHING with Bin or KILZ to seal in the odor, then paint everything with regular paint.

scrub floors if they are hardwood and going to be carpeted sand lightly then outdoor polyurethane all the hardwood, or concrete or whatever flooring thats paintable.

formula 409 works pretty good on hard surfaces like vinyl window frames.

you will have to have the forced air heat ducts and furnace professionally cleaned and deodorized.

this procedure is the same used for fire damaged homes or those with urine odors.

sounds like lots of work, if you dont do it this way the odor will reappear anytime the weather turns warm and moist.

It really doesnt remove the odor you cant as it permanetes eveything like walls, what you must do is seal it in walls and stuff.

[hallerb]

if your despeate to keep the carpet, lift it all and take to a local company that cleans carpet putting it thru a bath. big pricey project. then replace padding the smell is in there too.

I have done this more than once YUK JOB, once for smoke oncce for urine.

Both homes smell fine today you would never know it happened

[Jim Elbrecht]

Flair ionozer by Ecoquest. Had a fire in my son's room- smoldering mattress smell would gag you. My brother-in-law brought over his Flair ionozer that he paid $350 for. 2 days later the room smelled like a spring day.

Went to ebay & bought one for about $150.

These are *real* ionizers, not the toy [ionic breeze] that you see on TV all the time. [another family member bought one of those to get rid of ciggarette smell and it didn't work for her]

The literature says it will kill mold & mildew but I haven't had a chance to test that.

Jim

[cornytheclown]

Get an old ...or new for about 35.00...oil burner transformer....take wires from the two high voltage terminals and jam both leads into a large ball of loosly crinkled aluminum foil....40.00 ozone generator that does the same thing as an ionizer......it generates ozone which is a disenfectant and deodorizer.

ozone is harmfull to breathe in large amounts so what you must do is a room at a time...with a window open and the doors closed.

The oil burner transformer is a current limited device so jamming the two high voltage leads into a wad of timfoil wont "short" the transformer windings.

I wouldnt let it run more than an hour or so continuous though as it will heat up and might begin breaking down the windings.....but you could put it on a timer.....or run it while working in other parts of the house.

[Goedjn]

jeeze, if you're gonna do that, you might as well build a jacob's ladder and have some fun with it.

[georgie]

Clean or replace drapes. Steam clean carpets. Spread plenty of baking soda on carpets and let sit for a day or two to absorb smell. Gently wash walls. Gently wash ceiling or paint. Let the room air out for a few days.

We washed the drapes, walls, and linens in a heavy smoker's bedroom. We also spread a bunch of baking soda on the carpet and let it sit for a couple days before vacuuming. After airing out the room for a few days, there was no hint of smoke smell.

The biggest culprits were the drapes, which reeked, the carpet, which smelled funky, and the linens, which just smelled smokey.

g

[Doug Kanter]

Baking soda is amazing.

[Phisherman]

Tobacco odor can be very difficult to remove. There are ozone generators that work well, but it is bet to run these units while the house is vacant. Remove/replace carpeting, carpet padding and prime (Kiltz)/paint all walls and ceilings.

[Doug Kanter]

There are companies which specialize in cleaning up smoke damaged houses other unusual horrors. The OP's fire department would certainly have suggestions. If the job seems enormous, it might be worth hiring one of these firms. Some of them work miracles.

[BobK207]

I'd put my money on Fabreze. The stuff really works

I accidently cremated two ham hocks while making split pea soup. I put the pan on full high burner for about an hour (instead of turning it off as I had intended)

When I returned to the house after a one hour walk, the house was filled with thick smoke (actually just from the ceiling to about waist height).

Took about an hour to empty the house with fans. The house reeked of a sick, sweet burned smell............it was nasty!

I had the drapes cleaned, I wiped down the walls & floors (tile) w/ TSP a couple fo times

I sprayed Fabreze on all of the fabric items (carpet, furniture, pillows, etc) that I didn't want to replace or pay to have cleaned. The smoke really only got into about half the house (kitchen, family, dining & living rooms)

I used several (many) bottles of the stuff but after a rew months the smell was COMPLETELY gone (as was the reminder of my attempt to "burn down the house")

I'm sold on the stuff, it really worked for me.

cheers Bob

[DawnInOhio]

replying to Cindy, DawnInOhio wrote: I had a smokers car, a gentleman suggested I get a large bottle of imitation vanilla and sponges and completely douse them in the vanilla, put them under seats, and back window area.. Basically scatter them for a few days. The result was smoke smell gone and no lingering vanilla smell either. You have to wash everything, including carpet, and change all filters. Once had a smokers used fridge! It was spotless but that smell was IN the motor. Yuck.

[DawnInOhio]

replying to Cindy, DawnInOhio wrote: I had a smokers car, a gentleman suggested I get a large bottle of imitation vanilla and sponges and completely douse them in the vanilla, put them under seats, and back window area.. Basically scatter them for a few days. The result was smoke smell gone and no lingering vanilla smell either. You have to wash everything, including carpet, and change all filters. Once had a smokers used fridge! It was spotless but that smell was IN the motor. Yuck.