How to Clean Car Upholstery

Introduction: Regardless of how careful a car owner may be in maintaining their vehicle's aesthetic qualities, there will eventually be a need to clean a car's upholstery. While the knowledge of how to clean car upholstery is fairly straight-forward, there are a few minor tricks that can make the task easier with less chance of damaging a car's interior. A big help to clean car upholstery is to apply a bit of prevention to make certain that spills and stains are tended to in a timely fashion.

By immediately blotting a spill when it occurs a car owner can reduce the amount of the substance that is allowed to penetrate the upholstery, and therefore make further cleaning efforts much easier at a later time.

Step 1: How to clean car upholstery begins with a thorough vacuuming of the car's upholstery including the carpeting. A clean cloth soaked in warm water can then be wiped gently across all upholstered surfaces to remove topical dirt. It is important during this step not to apply too much water or pressure when rubbing the car's upholstery, as it may push dirt further into the upholstery material.

Step 2: In car's that have cloth upholstery, a cleaning agent can be made of 1 teaspoon of dish soap, 4 ounces of apple cider vinegar and one quart of warm water mixed inside of a spray bottle. This mixture is then sprayed onto the car's upholstery in a liberal manner in a one foot by one foot area at a time, left to sit for a few minutes, and then blotted dry with a clean cloth. For areas that have heavy stains more than one application may be necessary, but the homemade cleaning agent works quite well in most instances.

Step 3: In car's that have vinyl upholstery, a mixture of 3 teaspoons of baking soda in a quart of warm water sprayed on the vinyl and wiped off usually does a very nice job in restoring the upholstery to it's former glory.

Step 4: To clean car upholstery that is leather, it is always advisable to follow the manufacturer's recommendations  in choosing the proper upholstery cleaner. Leather seats in cars can be extremely easy to discolor or fade with chemical applications, and can be tremendously expensive to replace. If in doubt of how to clean the leather upholstery in your car, it is a wise investment to take it to a professional for an appropriate cleaning.

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