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You are here: Home / household tip / First Aid… Remove Sticky Residue

First Aid… Remove Sticky Residue

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com

A few years ago, I shared with you how to get a leftover sticky label off a jar, (you can read that post here).

This time, it’s not a jar I needed to remove the sticky residue from, it’s our wood floor!

Although I opted for soft pine flooring for the main floor of our recently renovated house, I want lots of dings and dents and wear marks to age it, but I don’t want sticky patches!

When we put a pair of chairs in front of the fireplace, I put on those sticky felt chair pad floor protectors. In most cases that would work, except in our case it didn’t. Reason is because the floors are somewhat rustic with gaps and uneven seams between the wide planks.

When the chairs got slid around, the pads on the bottom of the feet got snagged in the cracks of the floor, eventually peeling them back so that the sticky part was facing down and the sticky residue of the pads scraped off onto the floor.

Eventually, those sticky spots got covered with dust and ash from the fireplace leaving this look:

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
Floor protectors gone wrong left sticky marks on floor!

There were several dark spots, streaks and marks all over the floor in front of the fireplace where the chairs sit.

Time to get out the cooking oil!

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
Get out the cooking oil and a terrycloth rag!

My mom taught me this is the best thing to remove sticky residue with. Some people use peanut butter, but I don’t care for the lingering odor of P.B. so I stick, (or should I say UN-stick) with cooking oil for my glue remover.

I simply pour out a little oil onto the rag.

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
Pour a little oil onto rag.

A good textured terry rag like this one works best…

Then rub the residue.

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
Wipe off sticky residue.

To remove sticky residue on some spots, I found it best to wipe on some oil on those bad spots and let it soak in a minute before going back and rubbing it off. That seems to loosen up the surface a bit.

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
All the sticky residue came off onto rag.

There’s the proof that it works!

This totally removed the stickiness and the dark color that was from dust and ash sticking to the tack of the residue.

First Aid Remove Sticky Residue SimpleDecoratingTips.com
No sticky residue left!

There is the same place on the floor. All the dark sticky residue is gone.

The dents are still there, and many more to come! I want this floor to look like it’s had a history. 🙂

Last thing to do is a quick wash of the floor, to clean up the cooking oil residue, using my all time,(ALWAYS streak free!!) favorite floor cleaner, Bruce hardwood floor cleaner.

BTW: I’m not quite ready to embrace the chairs gouging the seams of the plank flooring, so the chair leg floor protectors are a different style now. No more sticky residue to peel off onto the floor! They come in many different sizes. I used the right sized round ones for our dining chairs.

They go on super slick, (as long as you order the correct size!) I quick snapped a pic of my husband putting them on one of the chairs:

This is what they look like on:

Here are several options of chair leg floor protectors that will stay put when the chairs get slid across the cracks between the floor planks.

Thank you for stopping by, I appreciate you reading along.

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Comments

  1. Donnamae says

    February 18, 2019 at 12:59 pm

    Never thought to use cooking oil. I usually use goo gone…but the odor afterwards is a bit too much. Thanks for the idea…and a lot cheaper, too! 😉

    Reply
    • Liz says

      February 18, 2019 at 1:14 pm

      Happy to help Donnamae. 🙂 My mom is the one who should get the credit though… She taught me this handy tip!

      Reply
  2. Kippi says

    February 18, 2019 at 8:37 am

    Great idea to use cooking oil to remove sticky from the floor without harm.
    Have a wonderful week,
    Kippi #kippiathome

    Reply
    • Liz says

      February 18, 2019 at 10:14 am

      Thanks Kippi. Yes, I love that this simple cleaning method works great but doesn’t have any harmful chemicals involved. 🙂

      Reply

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Welcome!

Liz here, decorator, DIYer and the author of Simple Decorating Tips.
I'm so glad you're here!

You can read a little more about my history HERE on the 'about' page.

My hope is to inspire you with tips on all things to make a home… decorating, DIY, painting, plants, and even a little cooking now and then.

With a goal of encouragement for you to feel empowered to tackle a little of your own DIY and create a home you love!

HERE on the home page you'll find the most recent posts you can catch up on, as well as the series collection featuring different properties we've renovated.

I'm so glad we've connected. Please reach out with questions or thoughts.

AntiqueFarmHouse


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