Tried cleaning the minor stains from my Panda seats on Friday with some of that Halfords Upholstery Cleaner stuff, followed the instructions well I'm sure..
Couldnt get the stains off, no surprise there...
But what I'm now more concerned about is a musty smell I was welcomed by on Saturday.. Sunday and this morning hoping it would be gone by now but unfortunately not.

I'm aware this is because I couldnt allow it to dry and air out properly...

What now?
And how to I avoid this in the future, any pro tips?

Might have used more water than needed.

It does need to dry out thoroughly, with the warmer weather, is it in a safe enough place to leave windows open by a few mm, parked in the sun?

Febreze might help, but get it dry first.

portland_bill said:

Might have used more water than needed.

It does need to dry out thoroughly, with the warmer weather, is it in a safe enough place to leave windows open by a few mm, parked in the sun?

Febreze might help, but get it dry first.

Click to expand...

Thanks, so I need to let it dry on the next scorching day? Is mm's enough?

I'll be sure to use less water next time. Still made 0 progress on Friday when I did all this :bang:

SB1500 said:

Thanks, so I need to let it dry on the next scorching day? Is mm's enough?

I'll be sure to use less water next time. Still made 0 progress on Friday when I did all this :bang:

Click to expand...

Need to allow air to flow to remove the damp air. Depends on location really, as long as it is secure you can open the window more. You need the sun to warm the car inside, to dry it out, so don't open by more than about 25mm, or you will lose some of the greenhouse effect, slowing the drying process. Air flow will be more effective than just heat.

Panda seat bases can be removed from teh 100HP at least by removing 2 X 10mm bolts so teh seat can be taken indoors for cleaning and drying. Did mine recently and gave them a soaking. It took 4 days in dry heat to get them dry again. Moral is,do one at a time! I took the oppoortunity to swap driver and passenger seat bases over as well. That was one of my better moves.

I use this stuff when cleaning my interior along with a rug doctor rented for the weekend. Interior came up great considering the state it was in:

http://www.cleanyourcar.co.uk/interior/chemical-guys-fabric-clean/prod_342.html

I use foam cleaner which is used for the interior and the windows. dont know if you have it in england but is works really good even got a lot of smoke stains out of the interior with it.

The Solution
...four months later...

In my case, the cause of the smell was simply that I kept damp microfibres in the car-wash bucket in the BOOT causing them to get musty and stink to high heavens.. which didn't take long to radiate a horrible smell.

Having taken them out, let the car air out with doors/windows/boot open for about 30 mins and gave it a little spray of Neutradol it's gone - and has been gone since. Even though the Neutradol has faded, there is just a fresh / fabric like smell now.

Hope this helps anyone with a similar situation in the future! - Check your boot!

Have you attached the biohazard warnings to the tailgate?

portland_bill I should have!!! It was bloody bad at the point before I worked it out! Lucky it was TurtleWax and water .. not some sort of food or worse! Couldn't imagine the sort of biohazard that'd have been!

Lol, I was going to suggest that a small wet vacuum cleaner, such as the Bissell Little Green Machine, might be a good investment. At least that way, you can extract most of the water after rinsing, which will greatly speed the drying. I use the Bissell HomeHeat Pro, which is a large vacuum with a heater, so that it sprays hot water.

-Alex

I've lost count on how many times over the years that I've mentioned, I use a small steam cleaner when cleaning seats, carpets on my upholstered vehicles. Purchased from Lidl years ago. Works well, little water left & very efficient.