Yes, this is the heart of the matter. I cleaned oriental rugs and carpets for about 10 years many years ago. The basic principle of washing your clothes applies to carpet too. Loosen the dirt and oil etc. with a mild detergent, and then rinse thoroughly. Whatever you put in the carpet to clean it should be removed or the residue will attract more dirt that won't come out with vacuuming. We would use a rotary scrubber with a brush and detergent dispenser to loosen the soil, then steam clean with plain water. Spotting tough spots was done as we steam rinsed. Pretreating spots had to be done quite often too. Proper professional carpet cleaning can be quite involved and labor intensive. I won't even get into oriental rug washing, as it is way more involved than carpet.
have to see the carpet and it's wear and tear. And also the first rule of carpets is you can't really truly clean them.
All handmade rugs present different challenges to cleaning. However, as I said the process of cleaning them is somewhat like doing your laundry. If your tribal rugs have natural dyes like Navaho's you have to be careful or the dyes will bleed outside of the design, especially if you use any kind of alkaline cleaning agent. (most soaps are alkaline) If the rug is a more modern type you could try washing it with a mild soap like Woolite, and rinse with plain water. It doesn't hurt to add a little white vinegar to the rinse either as the acid will stabilize the dyes. (little being the key word) Doing this outside on a clean surface is best and you can use your garden hose and a watering can. You can use a wet vac to suck as much water out of them as possible. The rug can then be dried upside down on the clean surface so any residue will wick up to the back. If you have a white fringe on the rug you can minimize browning by covering the fringe with clean light colored towels. The thicker the rug the longer it'll take to dry. Sounds like fun, no? FYI, if your rugs have any silk in them or are antiques or valuable, you should probably seek a professional that specializes in them and not a carpet cleaner that says they can do it.
+1
I think you can order them online these days.
Thanks very much! Now you've confirmed my guess that I should not attempt same under any circumstance.
I worked with one from Russia really nice lady and super educated but was washing dishes for a living. Seriously tough cookie by the way.@anotherbob I think you can. The Japanese models are getting a bit thin on the ground these days and the Vietnamese supply sort of dried up in the late 70s. These days its either the Chinese import variety or something from Russia. The later are pretty good deals since not only do they clean carpets but I hear they can break up concrete and chop down trees. The draw back is the food APP. The 2.0 model only does stews and stuff with root vegetables. The newer upgrade with AI is supposedly better but not available yet!
