Remove Gum From a Car's Interior
Children are notorious for playing with their gum, wrapping it around their fingers, taking it in and out of their mouths and blowing bubbles. Quite often, the gum doesn't end up in the trashcan but finds its way to other places, including your car's interior. Fortunately, there are a number of methods that work well for removing gum from both fabric and leather car interiors.
Contents
Steps
Freezing Gum to Remove it
- Place three ice cubes in a plastic bag. Take three ice cubes from your freezer and place them in a sealable plastic bag. You may want to double bag the ice cubes to ensure the plastic doesn’t tear as you press the cubes into the gum.
- A sealable bag is your best choice because it will trap the water as the ice cubes melt.
- You may want to place a rag between your hand and the ice cubes to make it more comfortable.
- Rub the ice on the gum until it hardens. Touch one of the ice cubes through the plastic onto the gum. If it’s warm out, you may need to switch to the other ice cubes as the first cube melts or breaks apart. Keep the ice in contact with the gum until it freezes all the way through and is hard to the touch.
- The gum needs to freeze all the way through to stop sticking on the other side.
- Get more ice cubes if you need to.
- Use canned air to freeze the gum. Instead of using ice cubes, you can also use canned air. Insert the straw nozzle from the canned air into the gum and spray. Remove the nozzle and the edges of the gum as well until the piece of gum is frozen solid.
- Be careful not to insert the nozzle too deep so as to pop the gum and make a bigger mess.
- Be careful, the temperatures coming from the canned air can be cold enough to hurt you.
- Scrape the gum away with a butter knife. Once the gum is completely frozen, use a butter knife to scrape it off of the upholstery. Most of the gum should come off in one piece, but there may be bit of gum or residue still stuck to the seat or carpet.
- Try to pick out any bits of gum that remained, or reapply ice to them to freeze them as well.
- Once the gum warms up, it will be hard to remove again.
- Scrub the area with upholstery cleaner. Once the gum itself is removed, use a carpet or upholstery cleaner to clean the area and ensure there is no stain left behind after the gum has been removed.
- Follow the directions on the upholstery or carpet cleaner of your choice.
- Ensure all the gum is gone before using the upholstery cleaner.
Using Adhesive Remover on Gum
- Pour a bit of adhesive remover onto a rag. Before applying adhesive remover to your carpet or upholstery, you will need to test it on the cloth to ensure it won’t damage or discolor it. Pour a bit of Goo Gone or similar adhesive remover onto a rag. It doesn’t need to be much.
- A small dab will suffice for testing the effect the adhesive remover has on the cloth.
- Do not spray the adhesive remover directly onto your carpet or upholstery.
- Test the adhesive remover somewhere hidden. Find a spot that is not easily visible and rub the adhesive remover into the carpet or upholstery with the rag. Use a dry rag after to wipe it away and allow it to dry completely.
- Wait a few minutes for it to dry then look for signs of damage to the carpet or upholstery.
- It’s important to let it dry to ensure it does not discolor the material.
- Pour more adhesive remover onto the rag. If the adhesive remover does not damage the material you tested it on, pour more of it onto the rag. Depending on the amount of gum and the size of the area, you may need to use quite a bit more adhesive remover.
- Don’t pour so much adhesive remover onto the rag that is saturates it, as it can cause irritation to your skin.
- Be extremely careful not to get any adhesive remover in your eyes.
- Scrub the gum with the rag. Use the rag and adhesive remover to scrub the gum. The adhesive remover will cause it to break up, trapping some of the gum in the rag and possibly creating small bits of gum that have come apart. These bits should be vacuumed up quickly.
- Once the adhesive remover dries, those small bits of gum will be difficult to remove, so act quickly.
- The gum itself should come apart, so try to pinch it with the rag to remove it from the seat or carpet.
- Clean the area with upholstery cleaner. Once all of the gum has been removed, use an upholstery or carpet cleaner of your choice to wash the adhesive remover and gum residue off the area the gum used to be.
- If you don’t clean the area, a dark stain may persist where the gum was stuck.
Pulling Bits of Gum Out with Duct Tape
- Pull a four or five inch strip of duct tape off the roll. If there are bits of gum you aren’t able to remove using another method, try pulling a strip of duct tape off the roll that is large enough to wrap around your hand.
- Duct tape’s adhesive can help get small bits of gum out of carpet or upholstery that other methods may not reach.
- This method is best when used after another method to remove the majority of the gum.
- Wrap the duct tape around your hand, sticky side out. With the adhesive side of the duct tape facing outward, wrap the tape around your four outstretched fingers so you can use them to press the sticky side of the duct tape into the bits of gum on the carpet or upholstery.
- Stick the tape to itself after you’ve wrapped it around your hand.
- Rotate the tape as you go so you will always have a fresh, sticky surface to try to stick to the gum.
- Press the tape into the gum. Press a portion of the tape down into the upholstery or carpet with your index, middle and ring finger firmly. Once the tape is pressed down onto the gummy area, rub the back of the duct tape with your fingers to ensure the adhesive has come into contact with as much of it as possible.
- You may need to do this multiple times if there are bits of gum scattered about from previous attempts to remove it.
- Pull the tape away rapidly. Yank the tape straight backward, allowing the adhesive to remove the gum from the carpet. There will likely be fuzz and lint stuck to the tape from the upholstery or carpet, so turn the tape on your hand and repeat the process until you are able to remove all of the bits of gum.
- Replace the piece of tape if need be.
- Larger pieces of gum may not come off using this method.
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