by Preetvy Ramasamy

Created on: February 15, 2009

Steam cleaning was discovered a few decades back by a barman. The latter was trying to clean lipstick off glass with steam from his cappuccino machine. He immediately realised his incredible feat and built the first steam cleaning machine. Of course, this was nothing like the steam cleaners of today: it was more of an improvisation consisting of a water tank, pressure valve and some means of heating the water; most basic, but it worked. Since then, a whole industry has been built on the idea of steam cleaning and a lot of progress has been made.

Steam cleaning is just like washing without waiting for drying. As example, when you wash your clothes - say you have no washing machine or laundry service nearby or you are a great fan of old methods - you most probably rinse it first and then put some soapy chemical product and rub them. Well the idea is pretty much conserved in steam cleaning.

You want to clean your carpets because there is mud on it, or some kind of stain. The main arising problem is that it is glued on the floor and even more obvious: where are you going to take that few square meters carpet to clean it? You could always try a sponge, but that usually smears things up and makes the stain worse. So you steam clean it, which is the same process of washing except faster, even instantaneous one could say.

A steam cleaner uses water and detergent or other chemicals which have to be put into the cleaner's tank. When you plug in your cleaner, it instantaneously sprays steam and the input chemical together on the surface chosen and immediately vacuum cleans the surface. This is like rinsing, rubbing (steam cleaning is usually done by regular sways of the cleaner) and drying.

There are two core components of steam cleaning: The cleaning chemical and the vacuum cleaning. The cleaning chemical will try to remove dirt by itself, just like those used in washing machines. A whole range of these products exist, some specific to some kinds of stain and others more general dirt removal agents. The vacuum cleaning will ensure that maximum humidity is removed from the wet surface so that moisture does not build up, causing dirt to stick more easily.

Note that it is recommended to vacuum clean the chosen surface first and then steam clean as steam on large particles of dust might cause further stains. One example would be dry soil on a carpet: steam cleaning might cause a muddy stain which would make cleaning more difficult.

Many current steam cleaners have the vacuum cleaning option and thus it is easy to find an all-in-one cleaner.

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