carpet cleaning an rv

A bucket, scrub brush, and shop vac with an appropriate nozzle (the "claw tool" works pretty well) are a quite good facsimile of a proper carpet extractor, and in my experience much more convenient for tight corners. Plunge the brush in the bucket (warm water mixed with carpet detergent as per usual directions), scrub a bit of carpet so that it's fairly damp but not overflowing, and vacuum out the water and dirt. Another pass with rinse water will help get detergent residue out. At least on my steam vac, the hand tool is not especially effective, though the main carpet scrubber works nicely.

I wouldn't hesitate to clean the carpet for fear of water damage. Just get out what moisture you can, and take steps to help the rest to dry pretty quickly, such as opening windows, running a dehumidifier, or firing up the furnace or AC (depending on the weather and such).

I hired Stanley Steamer. They washed the carpet and put a scotch guard type treatment. They did a good job and it was not very expensive.

When using a cleaner with soap I always follow-up with warm water to remove soap residue. Without that step it seems that dirt sticks to the carpet and gets dirty again quicker.

I also rent one of the commercial carpet cleaners and use it once with the shampoo/cleaner - suck it all up and then refill with clean water and go back over again. You won't believe the dirty water you get up again the 2nd time. After I started doing this I didn't have the problem of the carpet looking dirty again in a short time after cleaning it. That soapy residue just attracts dirt. I rinse every time now. We are full-time and I try to do it 2X per year. After 4 years living in it, the carpet still looks good. ( We do have a dog too)

In my old Chinook I paid to have it done and was very happy with the results. They did the carpet and all the upholstery. Worth every penny.

My current RV has almost no carpet which is an even better solution for us.

Duck wrote:
We have used a carpet cleaning surface. It cost around $75 but much cleaner then I could do it and they do a better job of vacuuming up the water.
Don

x2

Moneual RYDIS H68 Pro RoboVacMop Hybrid Robot Vacuum Cleaner is the best robot vacuum hub best robot vacuum hub known to me so far.It has Washable dust bin filter.. It cleans better than most of our human cleaning personal - navigates perfectly around the room - perfect - thanks Moneual for producing a robot that can actually do the job

Upholstery cleaning are really a pain but its necessary now a days. I do my upholstery cleaning with commercial carpet cleaning Denver as the experts of Eco clean cares suggest not to use any chemical agents due to its ill effects.

We want for literally nothing, and I have done most everything around the rig(s) over 14 years of fulltiming, but I can still make a penny squeak, so I type the following not lightly. Pay someone to come in and do it. It'll be some of the best $$ you'll ever spend.

I removed all the cheap installed carpet and made some custom berber runners that I can remove, use our Hoover upright shampooer and then I hang them wet outside and take a hose to them to really rinse the shampoo out. Then a few cans of "scotch guard" for a little added protection. We really like the runner system since we leave them rolled up until we actual start a road trip so during loading, maintenance they don't see any additional use.

Larry