Cleaning mould, mildew and moss from paintwork and fibreglass

mildred

Guest
Last year we stopped using our van - didn't lay-it-up as such, just parked it out of the way and apart from running the engine every so often and turning it around to stop the brakes binding it hasn't been used.

Decided it's time to get an MOT so trying to clean it up a bit. It used to be white,
now it's G R E E N, that is, apart from where the snails have chewed through the mildew down to the paint.

I've had some success with hot soapy water (bio washing liquid) but it's still pretty bad. The hot soapy water has pretty much failed on the fibreglass roof.

Any ideas on how best to clean up to make it look respectable again? Any particular cleaning chemicals that work well?

thanks,

MildRed
 
i use washing powder in the bucket of warm water .then lots of rinsing. a really good polish and away you go. you cant beat regular washings and polishings . or waxings .
 
mildred said:
Last year we stopped using our van - didn't lay-it-up as such, just parked it out of the way and apart from running the engine every so often and turning it around to stop the brakes binding it hasn't been used.

Decided it's time to get an MOT so trying to clean it up a bit. It used to be white,
now it's G R E E N, that is, apart from where the snails have chewed through the mildew down to the paint.

I've had some success with hot soapy water (bio washing liquid) but it's still pretty bad. The hot soapy water has pretty much failed on the fibreglass roof.

Any ideas on how best to clean up to make it look respectable again? Any particular cleaning chemicals that work well?

thanks,

MildRed
Click to expand...

Bleach 1:5 solution, just paint it on with a brush leave it for a while and rinse it off. wear gloves and glasses as its strong stuff. You might need to stipple it into the corners a bit but will shift most things organic.
 
White Vinegar mixed 50/50 with water. Wear gloves, rub it in with a cloth and leave it a minute then wash off with a hosepipe.

If you use vinegar (especially on the sealant at the joints), it kills off the spores. I did mine this way at the beginning of the year and there is no trace of it coming back.
 
What ever you use, do it immediately after a good rainfall, rain water seems to soften up the grime, also makes a good rinse as well. I had a lot of success with the jet washer patio cleaner, take care with it though.
 
Thanks to all for their suggestions:

1) washing detergent [1]
2) Bleach
3)Vinegar
4) PamperVan [2]

I've got a large enough area to test all these - and it's all as bad - so the tests will be comparative; paintwork on metal, glass and self-coloured fibreglass.

I'll post the results here in due course ...
(Def. need a "geek" icon ...)

[1] I'll retry with the washing powder as opposed to the liquid I've just used with small success.

I'd used liquid in the domestic washing machine at "eco-friendly" temperatures for over a year and just recently the smell from the build up of organics got too much - also marking clothes - sorted by several hot (60C+) washes with powder. Some googling on that problem suggested that the liquids have no bleach, and so don't kill off the nasties, and neither does the low temperature.

[2] PamperVan looks interesting, There's a vid here: PamperVan promo by Elvis
 
The results are in ...

Decided to clean up the van today rather than order/wait for the pampervan stuff - so down to a shoot out between washing powder ( "bio" with bleach), vinegar, and bleach.

Interesting results. Vinegar on its own, whether left as 6% strength or diluted 50/50 with water, even having been left for 15 minutes didn't really do much on either paintwork or fibreglass.

Bleach (in various concentrations) didn't seem to do much on the fibreglass, but was quite effective at creating slime that could then be pushed around, on the paintwork.

The washing powder worked after a fashion on both paint and fibreglass.

Then tried doing a good soaking with really HOT washing powder solution, and following up with vinegar and/or bleach.

I had the vinegar (diluted 50/50) in a hand spray and it cleared the mess wherever it was applied - but only on the paintwork, didn't do much at all for the fibreglass unless then rubbed hard with a cloth.

Bleach solution, on the other hand - a good finishing rinse additive for the paintwork, but otherwise not as good as the vinegar, but on the fibreglass; excellent results - can't believe how easily the mould, mildew AND lichen that was growing shifted.

The only thing that needed lots of manual scrubbing away at was the snail poo - the washing powder solution seemed to soften it a bit, but it was pretty well stuck.

So - good hot washing powder (DAZ bio) solution (a cup in a bucket of water) for starters, let it soak in to the organic layer, then vinegar for the paintwork and bleach for the fibreglass.

Many thanks for the various suggestions that prompted me to do a test - otherwise I'd have stuck with just one, and not found out about the difference in paintwork/fibreglass.

Anybody have any ideas why they should be so different?
 
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