What Is the Role of Detergents in Restoration of Nutley Fire Damage?

6/5/2020 (Permalink)

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Training in the Science of Soot Removal Guide SERVPRO's Fire Restoration in Nutley

Lots of different products are touted as being "the" answer to tough cleaning jobs like those encountered after fire damage to your Nutley house. Relying on just one cleaner and technique is a mistake. Depending on the following conditions during the blaze, the types of soiling and practical methods to eliminate them vary:

• Materials consumed or heated by the fire
• Temperature reached during the fire
• Oxygen levels during the fire
• Water or other fluid levels in the materials consumed

How Do the Referenced Variables Affect the Soot Deposited?

When planning the phases of fire restoration for your Nutley house, we pay attention to the residues' characteristics and quantities. Wood and paper burn hot and nearly completely, leaving loose, dry ash we can brush, vacuum, and sponge away. When plastics, rubber, and other synthetics burn, the fire smolders at lower temperatures, depositing thick, sticky residues. Protein-based fires coat surfaces with greasy soiling, consisting of dehydrated foodstuffs and oils. Vacuuming and brushing are not enough for the last two types of soot.

If Brushing and Vacuuming Are Not Effective, What Works?

Protein-based coatings usually require a solvent and abrasive tools or products to loosen. Spray and wipe efforts are useful for the thick soot produced by synthetics or damp organic materials, but the selection of cleaning products to add to the spray is critical. SERVPRO managers and technicians are familiar with matching water-based cleaning products with water-based soot, and oil-based cleaning products (solvents) with oil-based soot.

How Do Detergents Fit into the Puzzle?

Often the soot deposited has both water and oil-based origins. Changing the characteristics of the additives is impractical inch by inch. What does rise to the occasion is employing detergents, which bridge the differences between water and oil-based products. Detergent molecules have a water-loving head and an oil-loving tail, permitting this cleaning aid to break up and emulsify both kinds of residues, holding them suspended in the cleaning solution to be rinsed off or picked up by cloths, towels, or sponges.

Your confidence in the trained employees of SERVPRO of Nutley / Bloomfield is well-founded. Give us a call at (973) 662-0062 to commence a constructive cleaning partnership.

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