Oil leaked through trunk mat

[nfs480]

My dad had a couple of quarts of oil stored in the trunk of my old SE-i back when he used to drive it, and apparantly some of the oil leaked out of the container and through the carpet. It didn't appear to leave any stains and I didn't even know about it until I went to check on the spare's air pressure earlier today. The carpet was stuck to the bottom of the trunk, I managed to pull it up but there are these large sticky patches of dried oil that actually seems exactly like dried asphalt, but sticky. Any ideas for how to clean that stuff off the metal bottom of the trunk? If you guys want pics of what it looks like I can certainly run out and take some.

[russiankid]

My guess would be to heat it up with something like a hair dryer and scrape it off.

[nfs480]

My guess would be to heat it up with something like a hair dryer and scrape it off.

Sounds like it should work, i'll make sure to give it a try tomorrow when it's daylight again! :)

[Bones]

Scape out as much as ya can with something soft like a plastic spatula (so ya dont scratch up the paint too bad), then hit it with some degreaser to get the last of it off. Steam clean the carpet after cleaning the metal underneith so it dont leak more oil outa the carpet onto yer nice clean metal.

[2oodoor]

Let us know what kind of oil that was, cause I wouldnt want ot use it in any of my cars!!! sounds like old creasol based quacker state oil.

[nfs480]

I would tell you, but it was spilled in my trunk at least a good year ago. So I have no idea.

[nfs480]

Well, I've finally gotten around to actually cleaning this stuff up, and according to my dad it was power steering fluid, not oil. So far I have been unsuccessful in getting any of it up off the metal, currently the car is sitting outside with this stuff soaking in degreaser (purple power).

[Dr_Snooz]

Oh, not to worry, the Purple Power will get the oil off...when it bubbles up the paint underneath it.

:)

[Dr_Snooz]

Just saw your other thread. It looks to me as if the oil saturated the sound proofing and turned it gooey. I would just scrape off the sound proofing (down to the metal), put down new sound proofing and touch up with paint.

I'm not sure how to put down sound proofing, but you can probably find something sprayable from Kragen or somewhere.

[nfs480]

wow, I didn't even know that was sound-proofing until now. It makes so much more sense. Thanks, i'll look into new sound-proofing.