[Ready1]

I was merrily painting some shelves with eggshell at the weekend, the shelves were on a dust sheet and when I lifted the dust sheet up the gloss had gone through onto the carpet, I then put some white spirit on and manged to remove it.  However, I have since read a post on this site saying:

'Don't use white spirit it's very unstable and if the carpets have a secondary backing it will loosen the latex causing delamination and loosening of tufts.Often when you go into a property where the client has used white spirit you will see that there is what appeares to be a bubble under the carpet this is the reason why'

This is EXACTLY what has happened to me! does anyone have any ideas as to how to get rid of the bubbles??

Many thanks
Claire

[Neil Gott]

Claire, wait till the carpet is thoroughly dry. The bubbles MAY disappear.

If not, then I guess some kind of glue injection may be the answer. I have no experience of that, but somebody else on this board might come to the rescue

[Dynafoam]

Clair,

What you have produced is delamination, a breakdown in the structure of the carpet where 'layers' have come apart.

Niel is correct in that the only repair would be to replace the latex adhesive that has been broken down by the white spirit. The problem is that the upper layer has swolen in comparison to the lower layer, so any attempt to glue the two back together is likely to result in wrinkles unless the upper layer shrinks bact towards its' orriginal size - which is unlikely.

Best look out your insurance policy.

John.

[Derek]

Hi

I recall a carpet cleaning colleague many years ago telling me that he dealt with this sort of problem in the following way...
He checked the lay of the carpet and the pattern if any.

He would then slice the carpet with a very sharp stanley knife ..peel back ...trim so that when the edges were put together they lay flat...apply glue and refit leaving a weighty object on top to hold the join in place intill the glue has set.
I had cause to try it for a customer on one occasion and it did work...
mind you I did have my fingers crossed all the time which made the cutting part difficult

Derek

[Dynafoam]

Derek,

I have actually use a similar technique myself, except that the first cut was made with sharp scisors to reduce stress on weakened blistered segment. I then inserted a piece or vinyl flooring into the blister and pressed down onto it so that the edges over-lapped. A sharp knife was used to cut through both layers of the overlap to produce a perfect mating. (The vinyl was there to protect the backing).

The remainder of the repair was as you described.

I did not sugest this to Clair because if the repair turns out unsatisfactory she is on her own, whereas an 'accidental spillage' should be covered by household contents insurance.

Sorry, Clair, if I assumed that you may not be sufficiently competant to conduct the repair.

John.

[Robert_O]

The use of a hot melt glue gun can be very useful with this type of small repair work.

I know that mine has been invaluable to me.

Regards

Robert Olifent