[james roffey]

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.
 

[Jamie Pearson]

What odour did the flame test give?

[james roffey]

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.

[Jamie Pearson]

White smoke, orange flame, burning paper smell?

[Neil Williams]

Cotton by any chance? That'll burn to ash.

if we make the viscose wet its strength decreases., but in cotton strength increases

[markpowell]

Have you done a float test?
Mark

[james roffey]

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.

[Jamie Pearson]

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?

[Neil Williams]

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 

[james roffey]

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

[Steve Barnett (Carpet Care Plus)]

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 ?

[markpowell]

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

[james roffey]

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