dgjks6

So I let me son in-law take the 911 to get groceries. A couple days later my son drives it and says it smells bad. Really bad. I figure he's over exaggerating. He says it smells like fish.

I get home and the smell is so bad I can't sit in the car. Looked all over and can't find the source. All drains clear. Carpets dry. I pull out the seats and on the center console carpet where the passenger seat was is a thick dried area. That's where the smell of from.

So steamed vacuumed three times over the last 5 days, seats out, top down. Can't get the smell out of the carpet.

Any ideas. I'm ready to pull the carpet and burn it.

JW911

If it were me I would ask my son in law to pay for a carpet replacement. Seriously stinky stuff is nearly impossible to get out of carpet fibers and backing. I once had my young son puke in the back of a loaner Audi. Within minutes I was shampooing it up. 5 shampoos later, baking soda, deodorizers, etc. and it was still awfully stinky. I can't believe they never called me after I returned that car.

msingh5649

seems odd that it continues to be so strong of a smell. Can your soin tell you exactly where he put the groceries? Did he buy fish? or is that just an element of the story?

bheit1

Make sure you don't have mice in your a/c ductwork. They typically have a strong urine smell however.

J.Tan

You can try using a Ozone machine to deodorize the cabin. The cheapest one I saw was $60 on Amazon. Put your roof up and windows up and let the machine run for 2 hours.

dgjks6

We had fish. It's not the ducts. Or the drains. You can smell the area on the carpet where the stain was. I haven't sniffed so much carpet since my college days.

Upscale Audio

I can't see how a grocery run can cause that much damage. It must have been fresh fish and leaked a lot. Leave the windows down and it will go away eventually. There are microbe treatments for urine. Wonder if that would work.

Porschejam

As it's clearly a biological odor, have you tried an enzyme cleaner like Nature's Miracle?

You'll be wanting to neutralize and remove any biological remnants.

If that doesn't work, ozone it.

dgjks6

Got two dogs. There got some natures miracle somewhere. Will give that a try. On the plus side the inside of my car has never been this clean.

wjk_glynn

This is of no consolation, but there's a classic Car Talk episode where a listener called in about his dog puking into the air vents, and what to do to try to get rid of the smell... absolutely hilarious...

https://www.cartalk.com/radio/show/1...es-blew-beets#

Iceter

Some smells don't go away. Smoke, vomit, cat and mouse pee...I suspect fish juice should be on that list.

If it's in carpet, it's also in the padding underneath. I suggest you just bite the bullet and replace both before the odor permeates every cloth piece in the car and settles in the vents.

When i was in college, I drove my Mom's new car to a wedding. My girlfriend at the time overindulged on white wine and shrimp cocktail and barfed it up all over the inside of the car on the way home. We both cleaned that car multiple times. Until it was sold years later, you could smell fishy, sour wine whenever it rained and the humidity was high.

Chaos

Did you throughly interrogate son in law? Ask daughter?

Balr14

Once you get past the smell, you've it licked.

jamesinger

time for a full track build out.

dgjks6

Odor treatment spray, pre spot cleaner and steam vac 3 more times and smell is either gone or covered up.

I agree it's probably in the padding and I'm looking on eBay for carpeting. Not bad enough for me to pay new Porsche price. My guess is I'll be good from now until the first warm day in May.

Thank God for cabs.