Clean It Up

UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: james roffey on November 05, 2011, 12:42:35 pm

Title: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: james roffey on November 05, 2011, 12:42:35 pm
Went to look at a fitted carpet the other day and my first thoughts were its a belgian wilton i looked at the reverse to see if the backing showed the pattern and it did not, i took a sample for a burn test which i did later.
The carpet burned vigorously and had an ash residue the only time i have seen this is with viscose, i have wet cleaned viscose rugs they have all been very shiny and quite distinct, i have not come across viscose in a fitted carpet, well not to my knowledge.
Have i misidentified this carpet, if not can it be wet cleaned,  am i asking a stupid question. :-[
 
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Jamie Pearson on November 05, 2011, 10:42:01 pm
What odour did the flame test give?
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: james roffey on November 06, 2011, 01:35:17 pm
Difficult to describe as i have a stinking cold at the moment  :(  it burned with an orange flame very vigorously to an ash  i have come across this is with upholstery fibre before.
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Jamie Pearson on November 06, 2011, 08:11:21 pm
White smoke, orange flame, burning paper smell?
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Neil Williams on November 06, 2011, 08:12:34 pm
Cotton by any chance? That'll burn to ash.

if we make the viscose wet its strength decreases., but in cotton strength increases
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: markpowell on November 06, 2011, 09:27:04 pm
Have you done a float test?
Mark
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: james roffey on November 06, 2011, 11:12:41 pm
As far as i understand the float test is only useful to determine if its polypropylene which it is not, and i have never heard of a cotton fitted carpet although i know cotton does burn like this fibre and it burns to an ash.
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Jamie Pearson on November 07, 2011, 09:07:33 pm
They could well be flax/linen carpets. I have a yacht to do in the new year where carpet cleaners wrote of £200k worth of em by cleaning them with a Sabrina maxi and formula 90. Nothing wrong with those products just the guys using them.

Are these in a very expensive house? Have you asked the customer what they paid for them?
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Neil Williams on November 07, 2011, 09:20:36 pm
I have a yacht to do in the new year where carpet cleaners wrote of £200k worth of em by cleaning them with a Sabrina maxi and formula 90.

Well if you're going to have an insurance claim you might as well make it worthwhile  :o
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: james roffey on November 08, 2011, 11:59:23 am
No they are not expensive carpets, i think i will go down carpetright to see if i can find them in there, when i do the job i will get a photo, they are tufted with a hessian/jute backing
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: Steve Barnett (Carpet Care Plus) on November 08, 2011, 06:14:22 pm
James, in the unlikely event that it is a viscose carpet, it would be expensive and unusual - certainly nothing that would be sold by the likes of carpetright.

What made you think it was a belgian wilton ?
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: markpowell on November 08, 2011, 06:58:53 pm
As far as i understand the float test is only useful to determine if its polypropylene which it is not, and i have never heard of a cotton fitted carpet although i know cotton does burn like this fibre and it burns to an ash.

I asked if you had done a float test, with you saying you thought it was a Belgian Wilton.
If its not Polyprop then its not a Belgian Wilton.
Mark
Title: Re: Carpet fibre identification
Post by: james roffey on November 08, 2011, 08:25:23 pm
Sorry Mark, my first thought when i saw it were  Belgian Wilton, i was just unable to identify what sought of fibre burns vigourously and to an ash my only experience of burning like that was viscose