Sticky Adhesive?

[MMS]

About a week and a half back, we had our basement carpet steam cleaned by Stanley Steamer, in hopes to remove cat urine from it. Of course, as fate would have it, the problem was much worse than we expected, and the smell was horrible. We knew we would have to replace the carpet. The carpet was indoor/outdoor carpet that had been glued on back in 2000.

On Friday, I started the laborious task of pulling the carpet back and up to remove. As I was doing so, I noticed the adhesive was very very sticky, no doubt a result of the recent steam cleaning. I set a couple small fans downstairs, plus cranked up the dehumdifier, and went and checked on it today. It appeared to dry a little, but still tacky.

Any idea on how long it takes for adhesive to dry like this? I figure I need to grind the adhesive off and apply a layer of sealant to get rid of the smell, but can't do anything with the adhesive the way it is now.

Thanks for any/all help!

[DerbyDad03]

I don't have an answer for your adhesive question (other than it may remain tacky forever) but I do have a few questions about the use of Stanley Steamer.

Did they know about the cat urine? Did they say that steam cleaning would get rid of the odor? If they did, and it didn't, did they still charge you?

[Joe]

With the adhesive the way it is, it may be much easier to get off with a solvent. Head to your paint store and get a small can of each of the many solvents they have. One of them is very likey to make the glop easily removable without completely dissolving it. Xylene comes to mind as something that attacks rubbery compounds. 3M also makes some adhesive removers that do a nice job. Read the labels, use ventilation, etc., etc. You know the drill. Good luck.

Joe

[Joe]

With the adhesive the way it is, it may be much easier to get off with a solvent. Head to your paint store and get a small can of each of the many solvents they have. One of them is very likey to make the glop easily removable without completely dissolving it. Xylene comes to mind as something that attacks rubbery compounds. 3M also makes some adhesive removers that do a nice job. Read the labels, use ventilation, etc., etc. You know the drill. Good luck.

Joe

[Richard J Kinch]

Here is the help you need: you are doing this all wrong. Strip the adhesive residue off altogether with methylene chloride paint stripper.

You must remove odorous contaminants. Leaving them in place with a covering of "sealant" is futile. Getting them wet and waiting to dry is also futile, as you have seen. The foul smell comes from gaseous products of biological decomposition, and that gas will work its way out of

*anything* you put on top of it, short of a hermetic seal.

I know you just wanna believe it can be done some easier way, because you were foolish enough to be suckered by the carpet-cleaning crooks, but it ain't so.

[Abe]

Agreed about removing the odor altogther. I bought a house that had urine soaked into the particle board underlayment in a couple of rooms. The only way to really solve the problem was to rip up the underlayment and put down fresh ACX plywood. It's not very hard to do. In your case, you might also consider OSB as the underlayment material.

[DerbyDad03]

-- In your case, you might also consider OSB as the underlayment material.

The OP said it was basement carpet. I'm thinking there is no underlayment, nor will there be in the future.