Cigarette Smell Removal?

impossible

 

Maybe try “damp-rid”. I used it to dry out my interior and remove the musky dank smell. A lot of surfers use it in their cars too to avoid smells and wetness.

 

I had a similar situation and applied a liberal amount Fabreeze onto all of the fabric surfaces. Interior cleaner and conditioner (i.e. Mother's) should be used on hard plastic, vinyl and leather surfaces. Also use carpet cleaner which will help quite a bit as carpet fibers tend to retain tobacco odors. The improvement in my case was night and day with barely a hit of cigarette smoke.

 

Ozium is the best OTC product I have found for addressing cigarette smoke/smell - I believe there are some hard-core cleaners with enzymes that might work better - I know of these only because my SO uses them in her dog/cat boarding kennels but not sure if they work on cigarette smoke - will ask/check and revert.

Cheers

 

Ozone.

 

Avoid it. My current daily has this smell. It does go away within a few minutes but if the windows are up with no AC it builds up. My girlfriend is asthmatic so it caused me a lot of issues. I had a interior detailing done and it helped a lot but still there.

There's also an Ozone generator which I heard can work but I haven't tried it yet. I'm probably gonna trade the car in.

 

I've used ozone generators in rental housing units to get smoke smell out. It worked ok, but also I cleaned every square inch of the place, put Kilz primer down and replaced all the carpet. I let it run overnight with the HVAC running. Smoke gets everywhere.

One thing to consider is ozone destroys natural rubber in no time flat. Also, smoke for sure is coating the climate ducting.

The only real way to get rid of the smell is to take the interior out and clean every square inch of everything. The house I cleaned up even had cigarette tar on the inside of the switch plates and electric cover plates.

 

From time to time we have had cars with cigarette/ cigar smoke smells, placing an ozone generator in the car overnight with the windows up performs miracles. Works great !
Gary Bobileff

 

I'd give it to a good detailer with an ozone machine. They can really make miracles. I would not think you would be able to really get rid of the smell by yourself.

 

The tricky thing is this is a potential purchase, so he has no way of knowing ahead of time how effective it'll be.

 

Ozone cleaner

 

Put a few bags of zeolite inside. Can't hurt

 

The smoke gets into everything. Carpets and headliners being the sponges..it will and can be worked out of the car..but it takes time. The Ozone thing does work but it will take a few sessions.

Carpet removal and deep cleaning with proper equipment will do the trick. The headliner. Is unfortunately a very different problem.

 

Even after treatment, leave a dryer softener sheet under the front seats to gently mask the order that will always come back.

remember smoke turns into tar, which gets into every nook and cranny and stays there forever.

you just can’t get to it.

 

I bought a car with a serious head cold once. It had 3k miles and was perfect.


Except... The guy smoked clove cigarettes and two days later I realize I had a major problem.

I will say I got completely rid of the problem. I tried so many things.

1. Change the cabin filter. Might have to do this twice.
2. Wipe the entire car down including the carpets and headliner with vinegar. Yes. This is crucial.
3. I would run an ozone machine if you can.
4. If it's really really really bad... Go to the grocery store they sell glade carpet powder for use on home carpet. Dump that **** all over. And vacuume it up like the instructions say Next... Buy the same scented candle or candles. If it's hot enough where you are... Cut up the candle and place it on plates. Put a plate on the dash one on the back windshield and two on each front seat floor mat. Next run the car with heat on full blast out of the floor vents. These candles get really oily and begin to sort of coat and overtake the HVAC ducts etc... Run the car for 4-8 hours.

5. You should be done at this point. Now it will probably smell like tropical paradise or whatever scent you chose... Either leave it... Or... Wipe everything down again with vinegar and run the ozone machine to get rid of that smell.

6. Get a nice leather conditioner like lexor or griots or whatever... And wipe the interior down.


I did this on the most atrocious smelling car.. and it was completely gone.

Before figuring out this method...

I did the ozone machine. It helped but not 100% same with vinegar. Same with just scrubbing and cleaning. Same with changing the cabin filter. I had to do everything.

Also I tried just backing soda instead of the glade home carpet smoke be gone product... It didn't do ****. I ran the car the whole bit. Did nothing...

I even used coffee beans and ran the car. I used ground up coffee.... I'd rather have a car smell like coffee than tropical paradise or whatever... It didn't really work. It absorbed the smell but it didn't rid the smell.

Anyways... I know that method works. I honestly believe the vinegar is the most important step then if it's bad the carpet and candle trick

 

Not true. I bought a bmw that smelled so bad of cigarettes I couldn’t stand it. Had a Dallas detailer, who claimed he could get rid of smoke odor 100%, come out and clean it. He used some kind of enzyme that eats nicotine. Car smelled 90 percent better but after a couple weeks in summer I could smell cigarettes again. He came back out and used ozone machine for 3 hours. Cigarette smell completely gone and has been for 3 years.

 

I used to own an auto detail shop and had to deal with this problem. You never mentioned what type of car? Cloth headliner is the biggest problem. Leather seats no prob.

 

I've never used vinegar on carpet, but it is the bomb for general cleaning. I bet 4:1 water/shampoo:vinegar would get a lot of smells out of carpet. It'll smell bad for a day, but vinegar breaks down quickly and smells fresh.

 

Also... People if you have never washed your bath towels in vinegar or your gym clothes in vinegar. You are missing out. It's a world of difference

 

Is this a newer Ferrari that was smoked in? Even I don’t smoke in my Ferrari. Ozone will help a ton. As others have wisely suggested it will attack leather/rubber, so timing it’s use is important. A chlorine treatment does wonders too. I’ve had good luck removing odors from my truck with this:

https://store.detailking.com/chlorine-dioxide-vapor-generator

 

We rented an RV to a couple. Of course they smoked in it for the entire week. Smell was awful. We bought a small ozone machine. it got rid of the smell but it leaves it's own smell behind. It will go away after a while.

An unattended bottle of red wine blew up in our daily driver car in the summer heat a few weeks ago. We cleaned but couldn't get wine smell out. Used the machine. The smell is gone now.