Yellow stains on clothes: causes of appearance, methods of removal, tips

06.09.201610.02.2017 Maria Ivanova 2 comments

Have you often encountered this situation: you’re just preparing your favorite thing for release, but you notice disgusting yellow spots on it? In the turmoil, you start looking for a new outfit or rush to wash out stains, but in the end you are late, your mood is ruined, and you are not dressed at all what you wanted.

What are these yellow spots on clothes? Where did they even come from? Why do they appear after washing? How to get them out? Let's find out!

Why do yellow spots appear?

Oddly enough, you will not find an exact answer to this question. There are a lot of reasons for the appearance of yellow spots, so it will be difficult to determine the true culprit of damage to your clothes.

But in order to prevent such “incidents” in the future, you will have to protect your wardrobe from all factors that contribute to the appearance of stains!

Housewives often complain that yellow spots and dots appear on white clothes after washing. But stains, as a rule, cover the entire arsenal of your wardrobe; yellow stains are simply less noticeable on colored and dark tones.

How to remove yellow stains from delicate fabrics

Items made from delicate fabrics, such as wool or silk, often cannot be washed normally, and not every product is suitable for removing yellow stains from such clothes. Aggressive substances lead to thinning of fabric fibers and sometimes to the appearance of holes.

How to remove yellow stains from delicate fabrics? There are several ways:

If the item is silk, you can prepare a mixture of 10–15 drops of glycerin and 3 drops of ammonia. The resulting solution is applied to the stain for 15–20 minutes, after which the item is washed as usual.
These products are also suitable for woolen items, only glycerin and ammonia are diluted with a small amount of warm water.
Hyposulfite (thiosulfate) will also help in the fight against stains. This chemical was once used in darkrooms, but today can be found in pharmacies or home improvement stores.

Dissolve hyposulfite crystals in a glass of water and wipe the stains with the solution, then rinse the item in warm water.

Using these tips on how to remove yellow stains from sweat or other factors, you can achieve the ideal condition of your things. If none of the above methods help, use dry cleaning services; home “experiments” can lead to disastrous results.

What are the reasons?

Washing powder. The problem can be both the product itself (when reacting with water) and its concentration. Try changing the powder or using the one you already have in smaller quantities.
Washing temperature. High temperature provokes many reactions in the microcosm and contributes to the formation and consolidation of existing stains.
Protein and fat. These are components of your sebum (sebum) that react with tissue to form spots and dots.
Sweat. The main component of sweat is urea. It forms yellow marks when absorbed by clothing.

Deodorants do not reduce sweating, but only add aroma. At the same time, the cosmetic product itself reacts with sweat, which increases the formation of stains and increases their durability.

Ironing. When steam ironing, irons can often leave yellow rusty spots, indicating that the water is stagnant and it’s time to wash the iron.
Bleach. Surprisingly, it can also leave large yellow streaks on clothing. Carefully read the instructions for use of this product before use!
High water hardness is the cause of stains after washing. Hard water is a result of a high content of metal salts. You can tell that the water in your tap is very hard by the poor foaming of the soap and the deposit of limescale on the kettle or tap.
High humidity. High humidity may cause stains to appear when storing your wardrobe. Clothes should be thoroughly dried before storing them in the closet, as damp clothing is an ideal environment for mold to form. It is also necessary to sufficiently ventilate/ventilate the room so that the total air humidity in your home and closet does not exceed the norm (40-60%).

What to do with yellow spots and dots?

If your clothes are already covered in sweat stains, then you shouldn’t give up on them. Your favorite item can still be saved! Let's try to remove the stains!

What will you need?

Look in the kitchen and medicine cabinet, and then decide what from this list you have and what you are ready to use.

Kitchen soda (or sodium bicarbonate).
Hydrogen peroxide.
Vodka.
Any Fairy type detergent.
Food vinegar.
Aspirin, or salicylic acid (acts like acetic or citric acid).

You need to wash the stain first. Cold or tepid water works great.

Why isn't it hot? The protein, which is part of the secretion of the sebaceous and sweat glands, reacts with the salts contained in cosmetics - this gives a yellow color. And hot water denatures the protein (that is, it causes it to coagulate, as when boiling a chicken egg), so the stain penetrates deeply into the fabric, which will prevent it from being removed.

How to make a makeshift cleaning product?

Regardless of what you find in your kitchen and what product you choose, mix it with warm water in the following ratio:

baking soda – 3:1;
hydrogen peroxide – 1:1 (by mixing soda and peroxide you can get a good stain remover);
vodka – 1:1;
Fairy type detergent - 1:1;
food vinegar – 1:1;
ammonia – 1:1;
Aspirin - crush 4-5 tablets before dissolving them in water.

The less water you use to dissolve the aspirin, the higher the concentration will be.

What should happen? When you mix the product you choose and warm water, a substance of a certain consistency should form.

The baking soda will become a paste.
Hydrogen peroxide, vodka, vinegar, ammonia and aspirin tablets will dissolve.

If the selected ingredient is water-soluble, you will need to prepare a sufficient amount of detergent in advance to completely saturate the area of the stain on the fabric.

Another method: if you don't want to bother with a liquid cleaner, you can mix the resulting substance with a Fairy-type gel detergent.

How to wash white bed linen from yellowness?

How to wash white bed linen from yellowness? This problem has not only appeared now, so there are many modern and old folk remedies in order to rid bed linen of unpleasant yellowness. Previously, as we already recalled, our grandmothers boiled yellowed bed linen and added blue during boiling, believing that this would give it a fresh blue color.

The boiling process lasted so long that water was often added, which evaporated during boiling; in general, the pleasure from such work was very dubious. In addition, it is worth considering that the fabrics that were used to sew bed linen in the time of our grandmothers could withstand the Third World War, if necessary. The density of the fabric was more like tarpaulin.

Modern fabrics from which PBC is made are more delicate and thin, so few of them will withstand many hours of boiling. Not all of them can withstand washing at 90 degrees. So, for example, if you bought a family set of silk bedding, the manufacturers will write a temperature of no higher than 30 degrees in the washing recommendations. Many manufacturers recommend washing their product at a temperature no higher than 40 degrees.

Let's see what folk methods, more humane ones, have been left to us as an inheritance. The first substance that has been helping housewives achieve sparkling white bed linen for many years is baking soda. How we will whiten bed linen with its help. The first method, which can be used if the linen is in more or less normal condition and the yellowness is still barely noticeable.

For such laundry, you can simply add soda during normal washing in the machine. Baking soda also helps in removing blood stains from fabrics; we already know how to remove blood stains from bed linen. In addition, soda, dissolved in water, can make it softer, this will have a positive effect on the quality of washing, because, as you know, if the water is very hard, it contributes to the formation of yellowness on white bed linen. Therefore, the softer the water, the snow-white the laundry.

If the PBC has turned yellow for a long time, then simply adding baking soda during washing will not be sufficient. Here you already need a special bleaching mixture, which you can prepare yourself. But pour 500 grams of soda into two tablespoons of ammonia, fill it all with five liters of water, mix thoroughly.

Soak the bed linen in the resulting liquid. We leave the linen in the solution for at least two hours, after which it is necessary to rinse well and then dry the bed linen so as not to store it wet, otherwise the procedure for getting rid of yellowness will have to be carried out very often.

How to remove a sweat stain?

Removing sweat stains is possible using products such as:

liquid cleaner. It should thoroughly saturate the stained area or the contaminated item completely;
gel or paste detergent. It should be applied in a thick layer and added as it is absorbed;
fine brush. It won't hurt at all if you rub the stained area on things. You can use any fine brush of medium or low hardness.

Chemistry lesson: You probably remember from school that when soda reacts with acetic acid, carbonic acid is formed (it is unstable, so it quickly breaks down into carbon dioxide and water). That is. at a visible level we observe a rapid release of gas. Therefore, if you add vinegar to a soda solution that has soaked a stain on your laundry, “bubbling” will begin, which will remove the dirt well.

Give the cleaner time! No matter how much you would like to quickly find yourself in your favorite sweater, be patient - you need to leave the cleaning product on for a while (the number of hours depends on the degree and duration of the contamination: the process of discoloration of the yellow spot can take from an hour to half a day).

You can repeat the cleansing procedure many times until the stains on your items are completely removed. It is also possible to combine liquid and paste (gel) cleaners to achieve better results.

How to remove white spots?

White spots also bring a lot of trouble. Their nature is organic, and they often appear from sweat. As a rule, black and colored clothes are affected.

The removal process is practically no different from that with yellow spots.

The white stain should be washed in cool water.
Available remedies include: salt (5 tablespoons per 1 liter of water), vinegar and ammonia in the same proportions as for yellow spots.
Leave the product on colored and black items for no more than 1-2 hours (due to the instability of the paint and the risk of discoloration).
It is worth washing things in hot water.

Strong products for stubborn stains

If the listed methods do not help remove yellow marks on clothing, you can use the following highly effective products. They will help restore the whiteness of a T-shirt or blouse, even if the item has been lying around for a long time and the stains on it are old.

Prepare a solution from the following ingredients:

purified gasoline – 30 ml;
denatured alcohol (technical alcohol) – 40 ml;
ammonia – 20 ml.

The solution is applied to the fabric for no more than 5 minutes, after which the item is washed as usual.

Citric acid and rubbing alcohol

Add a little lemon to a small amount of alcohol (0.5–1 tablespoons). Soak the stain in the solution for 3-5 minutes, then put the item in the washing machine.

Vegetable oil and bleach

Soak yellowed items in a solution of the following ingredients:

chlorine-free bleach – 2 tablespoons;
vegetable oil (any) – 2 tablespoons;
washing powder – ¾ cup;
boiling water – 5 l.

Place the soiled items in a container with the solution and wait until the water cools. Afterwards, wash your clothes in the machine. In some cases, vinegar (2 tablespoons) is added to the solution, this helps enhance the effect.

Gasoline or turpentine

Since these substances are aggressive, they are applied to the stains for a few minutes to avoid damaging the fabric. Afterwards the item is washed as usual.

It should be noted that the above methods are suitable for fabrics with a dense structure; a blouse made of thin material will be hopelessly damaged by strong products.

Old sweat stains: what to do with them?

With old spots, everything is almost the same as with yellow spots.

Unlike what was described earlier, it is necessary to soak contaminated items not just in cool water, but in diluted powder or bleach.
From the suggested remedies, apply alternately (!) substances in the following combinations: acetic acid + soda, ammonia + lemon juice or Aspirin + hydrogen peroxide.
Leave the product on things for no more than an hour.
As standard, washing is required in hot water.

Home medicine cabinet

It is not necessary to immediately use special bleaches and chemicals if the yellow spots are still fresh. Simply wash the item with laundry soap. If the contamination formed more than a day ago, you will have to resort to additional measures. These can be simple items from the first aid kit.

READ ALSO: Buy a mattress in Kharkov: which one, where, how

Hydrogen peroxide

First, soak the product in soapy water. Soak areas with yellow discoloration with peroxide. Leave for 20 minutes for the product to take effect. Wash as usual, rinse thoroughly so that no traces of peroxide remain in the threads.

Aspirin

Dissolve 2 tablets in a glass of water. Apply the solution to the yellow areas, after soaking the product in soapy water. After 2 hours, rinse the item thoroughly.

Urotropin

It does not act as quickly as hydrogen peroxide, but gives a high result. Before machine washing, add 1 spoon of product to the washing powder container. When washing by hand, simply add to the water along with the powder.

How to avoid the appearance of new stains?

Use quality deodorants and moderate the amount you apply.
To prevent sweat stains, you can use baby powder on the inside of your clothes.

If you sweat excessively, consult a doctor to rule out local hyperhidrosis.

Underwear will also help prevent damage to your things by absorbing the “blow” of sweat.
Don't let sweat stains become old, remove them every time they appear.

Remember: avoiding stains is much easier than removing them!

Don't let yellow stains on your clothes ruin your wardrobe and ruin your life by making you doubt your appearance!