Expert Fire Restoration in Frederick

7/27/2022 (Permalink)

Don’t let your property be a victim of fire damage, SERVPRO of Frederick County is only a call away.

Pre-cleaning Can Mitigate Fire Damage in your Home

Fires can leave behind different types of smoke residues in your home. Some smoke particles can bond with surfaces of a structure, especially in high-temperature and high-pressure property fires. Other particles adhere to surfaces and come loose quickly. Using pre-cleaning procedures effectively can help to enhance the efficiency of a dry sponge or chemical action by removing non-bonded soots first. 

The process of fire restoration in your Frederick home is multi-faceted. SERVPRO uses a similarly diverse approach toward cleaning damages in the house. Pre-testing, pre-conditioning, and pre-cleaning are just three examples of our mixed approach. Walls and surfaces exposed to hot smoke gather dust, soot, and ash. By removing these particles first, we can improve the efficiency of our cleaning method. Porous surfaces in the home generally absorb moisture and smoke, which can make them difficult to clean. We clean porous materials during:

• Fire Damage Restoration
• Fire Cleanup
• Smoke Removal

A homeowner can sometimes perform dry pre-cleaning techniques in the immediate aftermath of a fire. For example, vacuuming helps remove loose soot from the surface layers of materials. By eliminating loose soots, we can apply a dry cleaning solvent or sponge directly onto the surface material without contaminating chemicals or equipment. Other methods that our technicians use include compressed air, which is pointed directly at a surface. We lay down protective sheeting on floors before using compressed air or other agitated cleaning methods like brushing to prevent dislodged or airborne particles from affecting other home surfaces. 

• Precleaning heavily soiled surfaces with a dry sponge before applying a detergent or rinse agent can increase the effectiveness of wet cleaning.
• If humidity is particularly low, it can increase static electricity in the home. Vacuuming charged soot and dust is useful before following the cleaning procedure.
• Dry cleaning is often insufficient to restore a surface properly but can be useful in prepping for water or solvent-based cleaning solution. 

If your home has significant smoke residues, contact SERVPRO of Frederick County for fire restoration at (301) 662-1747.