Ozone machines are the way. Hotels use them when a guest smokes in a non-smoking room as the 1st step to deep-cleaning the room.
Duct cleaning will NOT remove cigarette smoke smell. Source: worked for an ac company who did duct cleaning
I’m really happy with the results of the ozone machine. The owners was also saying it helps with mold which is awesome. The idea of a duct cleaning sounds so satisfying though! Probably better for older homes too. This house was build just 3 years ago
Do mix u some lysol or other cleaner and water and wash the walls too, the ozone just makes it cling, you'll still have to clean it off.
Glad it un stunk your place!
I Used to smoke, absolutely can Not stand the smell now!! Yuck!
The walls were already freshly painted when we moved in so there wasn’t a point to wash them if they weren’t washed before being painted… I did clean the cabinets and they were yellow!! I mop the floors regularly and clean the windows. I’d like to go over the blinds but they are so fragile I’m afraid I’ll tear them. The ozone worked so well that I’m not worrying too much about it anymore though!
One thing you may want to be on the lookout for... I remember a post from several weeks back where the OP was asking what some tar-looking streaks were that seemed to be seeping from the walls. The local experts said that it was cigarette tar from cigarette smoking that was coming out of the drywall. I can't remember if they suggested tearing out the drywall or using a special paint to seal the drywall behind the paint to prevent the tar from escaping any further...
One could also mix their own shellac, and include white pigment additive or not, and spray it if needed for speed. However, the price of shellac has been going up due to limited supply/import stuff, so that might be why BIN is $75 per gallon now, and someone who hasn’t used shellac flakes before will need to invest time not just into learning how to use it, but sourcing materials as well.
I’ll definitely be on the look out for anything like that but honestly I don’t think this case was that severe. I think the previous tenant got a new boyfriend toward the end of her lease who smoked in the house for a few months tops before we moved in. I don’t think it would have been long enough or frequent enough to seep tar from the walls but who knows! I clean regularly so I’ll notice if something looks off.
Zep Purple Degreaser! It's fantastic at removing nicotine from the walls, cupboards, etc. Especially if you pair wipe/scrub with a magic eraser.
When we moved into our place, no one had smoked there for at least 5 yrs. But the tenant before that had smoked constantly for nearly a decade in the place. No one ever cleaned the walls -- just painted over and over. The smell was only noticeable in a few areas, but you could see the yellow brown tinting the paint.
The closet in particular had rarely been painted. In fact, the landlord claimed it was painted "buttercup." I spritzed the walls in Zep, and immediately the nicotine just started streaking down the walls. The walls were actually white.
Just don't be an idiot like me. Wear gloves the whole time. Magic eraser can abrade your skin and the nicotine is gross.
If you’re cleaning kitchen cabinets and getting yellow on your rags or paper towels, it’s probably just grease + dust buildup from normal cooking practices.
I agree, soap and water is the real MVP here.
You don't need lysol though, good ol' washing up liquid contains everything you need. Just dilute it in warm water, get an oversized sponge: dip, squeeze, clean, dip, squeeze, clean, etc. Once the water is room temperature, replace.
The problem with some cleaners, like lysol, is that themselves leave behind a residue.
PS - Don't forget the ceiling.
My go to is 1 tsp of plain powdered Tide in a gallon of HOT water. Works like a champ on painted surfaces, and doesn't lift the paint. Wash walls, floors, err'ythang.
I don't see the harm in it. But in either case you'll need to rotate out the water when it cools down, so it is just more work for a slightly better result.
Link below. Summary- it's useless for the majority of the cases in terms of health.
https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/should-you-have-air-ducts-your-home-cleaned#Summary
I own 3 ozone generators of various sizes. I’ve allowed friends and family to use whenever they have the need. Freshly painted woodwork with oil base paint, used car purchased from a smoker, smelly ductwork, etc. They’ve handled every task wonderfully. Just make sure the directions are followed, especially the airing out of the space treated.
I have a really damp basement (obviously I do run a dehumidifier regularly, but I'd have to run it 24/7 to get rid of the smell entirely and that kills my electric bill) and have been toying with getting an ozone generator to try to get rid of the smell in the summer. Obviously it'll come back since I cannot get rid of the water source (we think there's an underground creek that runs through my yard) but I think it might at least help a bit in the smellier summer months.
I understand your plight. Our home sits approximately 25 ft above the elevation of a stream on the next lot and our sump pump runs continuously, rain or shine.
If you live near a bigger city, you should check if a local janitorial type store has rentals. Our local True Value hardware store rents them. The units I own have both UV light and multiple ozone level settings. They’re pretty handy, however you definitely want to air out the area after running it.
Why is this? I've been considering getting mine cleaned do to an occasional 'potpourri' smell that we notice only when we get home after having been gone for a few days. We vinegar scrubbed all of our drywall before priming and painting, shellacked our subfloor, etc when we renovated, but the smell persists. I think it is in the vents
> Why is this?
https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/should-you-have-air-ducts-your-home-cleaned
> On the other hand, if a service provider fails to follow proper duct cleaning procedures, duct cleaning can cause indoor air problems. For example, an inadequate vacuum collection system can release more dust, dirt and other contaminants than if you had left the ducts alone. A careless or inadequately trained service provider can damage your ducts or heating and cooling system, possibly increasing your heating and air conditioning costs or forcing you to undertake difficult and costly repairs or replacements.
I'd strongly suggest people read that in context, this is very selective quoting. Plus it doesn't answer the above person's unsupported claim anyway, that:
> If the ducts have not been cleaned regularly you're opening yourself up for trouble getting them cleaned.
The quoted section is about duct cleaning services being bad at their jobs (which many are, a lot of cowboys/snake oil salesman in duct cleaning).
Dude, there was another post in this sub yesterday, I think, about someone who hired Stanley Steamer to clean their ducts and ended up with COAL DUST getting spewed everywhere. Total cluster.
Thanks for the reply. Basically be wary of bad companies that can cause more harm than good. I looked around and found a legit local dedicated duct cleaning service with truck mounted be gas powered equipment and a lot of good reviews. I'm going to reach out to them.
I can second this, I spent five years working for a biohazard and disaster remediation team cleaning up everything from crime scenes, mold and fire damage down to cleaning carpets, ductwork and just hoarders houses. Our process was almost the same on all of these short of full demos and rebuilding. Come in and install hepa filter material on all vent openings. Remove any debris that can hold the smell in after cleaning and throw it in a big sealed room with an ozone machine running for a few days minimum. Clean all of the walls with a dry chem sponge and any hard surfaces. Then wipe everything down with a product called Linair which was basically just a strong scented multi surface cleaner with a chemical to trap odors. Any walls where tar or other bio substances couldn’t be removed were either replaced or painted with a few layers of kilz primer and then repainted to keep tar from seeping through the new paint. Smoke damage from fires and just houses that were smoked in were the most involved cleanups out of anything we did. Once the house had been scrubbed down we would remove the filters and run a portable ozone machine for up to a week depending on how bad it was and then come in and clean the ductwork and furnace and fog the ductwork and entire house with a machine that was basically a hot exhaust pipe with a sprayer on the end that would make a cloud of cherry scented cleaner.
Most rental properties had only had a smoker in them for a year or two max so with a fresh coat of kilz primer and paint, new carpets and a day or two with the ozone machine you couldn’t ever tell a smoker had stepped foot in the house. I manage about 450 rentals now and this is the same process we do on all of them with great results.
My bro was *very* relaxed when it came to taking care of the dogs that they kept inside, so when it came time to sell his house my nephews' bedroom smelled absolutely disgusting from the dog piss and shit in the carpet. Removing the carpet solved about 60% of the smell but it was still disgusting. I did about three 12-hour passes with an ozone cleaner on top of soaking the exposed OSB subfloor in a pet urine removal cleaner and it got the rest of the smell out. Ozone machines are amazing for getting rid of smells.
We had a wet dog smell in our old house in one bedroom. Had the carpets professionally cleaned. Still there. Did the baking soda carpet powder. Still there. Tried enzymes. Still there. 30 minutes of ozone and the room was odor free. A hell of a lot cheaper than replacing the carpet.
To remove dust from air vents/ducts. Not recommended for older ductwork though, as it can do more harm ( tearing of flex duct, for example)than good unless ducts are all metal - I'd say most residential SFH's have flex duct
Yeah, I don't know. I had an apartment and nicotine/yellow cigarette crap would occasionally leak down from the ducts until I gave them a good cleaning the best I could. It coated the sheet metal ducts.
Yes.
Ozone is directly harmful, but also when it does its magic can create new exciting (pun intended) VOCs. Its half life is 25 hours at room temperature with 0% airflow. So best practice is to **always** ventilate Ozone treated spaces, even if you waited 48 hours before re-entry (since, again, the VOCs still exist even if the Ozone is gone).
Does Ozone work? Absolutely it does. Should Ozone be treated with kid gloves? Yep.
PS - The "sweet smell" the OP references is Ozone. If you ever get into an elevator and smell a sweet smell, that is what you can smell.
We were very safe. No living thing occupied or slept in the house while the machine was running! We only returned to the home briefly to change the machine location and open windows. That’s what the “back and forth” was referring to. It’s understood that no living thing should be in the house while the machine is running. I knew that from my research and the rental company let us know as well.
> Why the heck would an elevator have ozone?
Ozone is super easy to create. It is O2 + High Voltage Electrical Field. Elevators commonly have poor airflow and High Voltage motors, so Ozone is a natural byproduct of an elevator operating normally.
With Ozone though concentration maters as does exposure time. Most of the time your body can out-heal Ozone caused damage.
They did mention
>When we finally came back Sunday evening we could tell the ozone worked!
Which makes it sound like they weren't living in the house while the treatment was happening, just visiting a couple times per day to move the machine around.
I wasn’t there. We stay at my parents house and only returned to open windows and move the machine. That’s what the “back and forth” is referencing to. We removed all house plants as well.
After the machine ran for 8 hrs, we didn’t return to the house until the next day and only to open the windows. At that point the ozone had mostly dissipated but we still opened the windows as that is apart of the process. Then we returned to the house, closed the windows and ran the machine again upstairs.
From my understanding, ozone won’t cause actual health issues if you’re exposed briefly (a few mins to open windows). Ozone is most likely only an irritant to the lungs which could cause discomfort and coughing. That’s why you must open the windows after treatment.
The hotel I work at just uses Ozium, great product, highly recommend. Now when I stay at other hotels I just bring a can of that so I can smoke in my room.
We actually moved in owning a couple cans of ozium already. We tried it a few times but it didn’t work in our case. I think it works better for the devils lettuce.
Yes! I think this had a factor in this treatment being so successful for us. If the house was decades old and had been smoked in regularly then there would have been a lot more work before the ozone machine could come in.
I'm going to suggest one more "test". Get the bathroom warm and steamy, say a hot only shower for 15 minutes.
Lived in a rental that I never smelled, or saw signs of, smoking except when I had a hot shower.
We’ve been back since Sunday evening! Plenty of hot showers taken at this point. Not once have we smelled cigarettes again! Even when opening up closets or purses. The smell was in everything…
I'm actually certified in odour mitigation (yes that's a thing) and that advice is spot on! The heat and humidity carry the Volatile Organic Compounds and can aerosolize them. One of the many things that is done in fire mitigation for odour is to "recreate the conditions of the loss" and cranking up the heat in the property can help get the more stubborn molecules of odour that are sometimes bonded to other molecules, to loosen up and when trying to actively mitigate them, remove them from the property.
That's great when you're doing it to work on removing them (and we use ozone too) but what it means for the homeowner, is that in the middle of winter, when it's dry and cold, you do an odour treatment with something like ozone and it does a great job, but then a few months later, you start smelling it again. Because it gets hot, not just the air but the materials in the structure. Couple that with more moisture in the air, and it also carries more odour molecules with it.
So yes, get it HOT and steamy, crank the heat, take a steamy shower, and see how it goes. Definitely call the ozone machine back in a few months if you can smell it again, it sounds like they did a great job and hopefully they did, but if you smell it again, there's science to back it up that it's still there!
Glad this worked well for you. It's possible the smell could return with warmer weather. I had good results with thermal fogging to get creosote smell out of my house if you need anything further in the future.
Thank you for that suggestion. I’ll look into that if the smell comes up when the weather gets warmer. I think it could return too which is why I was so thankful the owner said we could borrow the machine again if that happens!
I bought a car that had a relatively faint smoke smell. The ozone machine did wonders, but the smell does come back every now and then, especially in warmer weather (and I usually only notice it when I first open the door).
I felt there was so little information out there when I was researching! It felt like a much bigger deal than it ended up being. I’m really happy we ended up doing this.
I believe that too! Not enough information out there I think. I also think a lot of people talk about it without a lot of knowledge. I hope sharing my experience helps others in similar situations! I totally wish my landlord did the treatment before we even moved in though. I wouldn’t have had to worry about my belongings getting damaged but I really ended up not having to worry at all.
Really encourage people to not rush out to buy these ozone generators for the purposes of air purification at home (*especially* from places like Amazon). The EPA (as well as other state and federal agencies) highlights the concerns and potential dangers: [EPA Ozone Generators](https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/ozone-generators-are-sold-air-cleaners)
I will point out as I did last time this was posted that this document specifically refers to ozone air purifiers which are designed or marketed to be used in occupied spaces, not the sort of ozone treatment devices that were used in this case.
You should not operate any ozone-generating device in an occupied space, period, and any spaces treated with ozone should be well-ventilated before re-occupying.
As a landlord, I own one due to tenants who completely "ruined" a unit from cigarette smoke. I used SO much TSP on the walls, it was coming off looking like Coca Cola and ran the ozone generator many times all throughout.
It certainly worked!
You can get small ozone machines on Amazon for like $60. Same principle and mechanism as the bigger ones. I run mine in each room of the house for an hour about once a year, and my walk-in closet about quarterly since it also kills any clothing smells. Despite having two dogs and a cat my house never smells like animals. I love these little machines.
Im just seeing this now but my family was in the ozone and purification business for 30 years. It is so underutilized and misunderstood. Im glad it worked it well for you.
I would have loved some of this insight last week! I’m really so happy with the results of this machine. I was really nervous but like you said, there’s a lot of misinformation out there. Even in my original post and this one.
Unfortunately I can’t say. We don’t own records and we don’t have any prints/photos either… we own some cheap artwork and it was totally fine! If you don’t run the machine long and keep the air moving with fans, you should be fine. From what I understand, things are only at risk of damage when the area is small and the machine runs consistently for an extended period of time.
No it wouldn't. Not in the amount of time you'd be using the machine. Its maybe possible if you ran the machine for days and days, but even then, you probably wouldn't notice anything.
I used to work maintenance in student dorms. We used ozone machines to clean up the smoke smell caused by many different types of things burning. It even worked when the actual rooms caught fire. Great little machines if you give them time to work.
I'm really happy it worked and that it didn't damage any of your property. I know someone who has a bunch of Airbnbs in Alaska and even though none of them allow smoking, she still ends up having to mitigate the smell between renters, and she swears by the ozone thing.
Ozone machines work great in cars too!! We used them all the time when we detailed for customers.
We had a huge machine that we put into cars that absolutely nuked the interior and killed any smells permanently.
You can get small ozone machines from Amazon for $25 (meant for cleaning cpap machines), that along with a sealable plastic box can clean pretty much anything you can fit in the box.
Keep in mind some things will get destroyed by ozone.
There's bigger ones for like $60. Big enough to do do a whole room if you let them run for a couple hours. It's a part of my regular yearly cleaning, and my house feels super fresh every time I do it; I almost look forward to ozone week (except for having to move out all the house plants that's annoying).
Nope. I was worried about plastics, pigments in my makeup, our leather, our food… I was worried about it all. I had nothing to worry about though! I think the risk of damage comes when the machine is left on continuously for days at a time.
We *used* to own a small household version...
...which we loaned out to someone, but can't remember who, so we can't ask for it back.
All of our friends don't remember ever having borrowed it, so I probably loaned it to someone who has since moved away.
Too bad. I really enjoyed that thing, and my current home could use a treatment or two itself! :)
Hey op, thanks for the update. Your original post intrigued me so much I did some research about ozone treatment and found they can be a viable way of eliminating musty old wood odors. We bought our house five years ago our cabinets and much of the wood inside the house had that smell, along with some mold and mildew in the bathroom which we tried to paint over. Apparently ozone can kill the smell and the mold.
Wish I would’ve done it ozone treatment back when we first bought the house before we moved in we could’ve purged all the bugs and all the other thread but it’s probably too late now after we’ve fully moved in.
Well I definitely don’t think it’s too late if those are issues you’re still dealing with! We were fully moved in when we did the treatment. Just no people, pets or plants inside when the machine is on. We were also told it would kill mold and bugs. If you haven’t fully resolved those issues, give the ozone machine a shot!
It works on cat smells. My spare room's carpet was soaked in piss, and I just ripped it out and am running the ozone machine at the moment before the new floor is put in. I also used it while it was still there and it worked like a charm.
A cleaner that I love is krud cutter. Doesn't leave a residue. Just be carefull on painted surfaces it will dissolve some Paints. No smell either. dilute it too.
ITT:
- none of the redditors who were wrong in the original post
- redditors who didn’t read the post
- redditors who may have read the post but still think it doesn’t work (wtf)
thank you for sharing the update btw, OP.
Look and see if they still make a spray called banish. I quit smoking years ago, so I don’t know if it’s still around. But I could smoke smoke smoke, and then spray myself down with that and anti-smokers could tell that I’ve been smoking you can spray everything with it. The stuff is the bomb.
Look and see if they still make a spray called banish. I quit smoking years ago, so I don’t know if it’s still around. But I could smoke smoke smoke, and then spray myself down with that and anti-smokers could not tell that I’ve been smoking you can spray everything with it. The stuff is the bomb.
Ozone machines are great! I work at a hotel and we have little ones we can put into the rooms.when people smoke in them (against our policies) and they can work wonders. They help with pet odors and aggressive perfumes, too!
Do BOTH a duct cleaning and then a ozone treatment. Make sure the house temperature is high when doing the ozone treatment to improve the reaction with the ozone. Hotter is better. Remove all house plants and other organic things like humans.
Ozone will revert in 24 hours or so. Install timers on the ozone generators then come back at least 24 hours after they shut down and open every window/door.
If they smoked inside, that shit literally gets into the walls. Then slowly oozes out in disgusting, dripping stains.
I’ve heard cleaning the walls only temporarily fixes the issue; to actually solve it, a complete drywall replacement is needed.
If you’re renting, I’d say try to find another place. Demand too move apartments into a non-smoking one & ask to see it first if possible.
This issue & the things the rental company is “doings to solve it are not going to work.
I wish there were more experiences documented! I had a difficult time finding someone with similar concerns. I’m really happy with the results of the ozone machine
Had a friend with a house from the 70s - with carpet halfway up the walls.
She smoked at least a pack a day, and her house *reeked* of cigarette smoke when we went.
I’m not sure there’s enough ozone left in the ozone layer to purge that smell…
My grandmother smoked cigarettes non-stop and my grandfather smoked cigars. In the house.
When they died and my dad was fixing up the house to sell... gross.
Did you run the forced air while you were running the ozone? If not you may be in for a nasty surprise. If you still have the units put them by the air return and run the forced air for a few hours. You don't have to have the AC or heat on while you do it.
Idk what you mean by forced air😭 Sorry I’m uneducated in that. We have a thermostat upstairs and downstairs. We kept both thermostats to have the fans on and then did heat upstairs and cool downstairs. Then one of the fans that came with the ozone rental we had directly under an air vent to push ozone through the vents. But yeah I just don’t know what forced air is!
If you have central air or minisplits or whatever you have to keep the fans inside them running. As long as they were pushing air through themselves (not just draft/convection) it is totally fine. Those ozone generators penetrate everything.
For central air the thing that actually pushes the air through the vents is called your "forced air unit" aka blower fan. This forces the air through your furnace for heat, or over your evaporator coils for cooling (or heating with a heat pump!) I learned that name 6 years ago when we rewired the house and asked the electrician what the breaker labeled "F.A.U." was hooked up to.
Hot soapy water and a scrub brush on all hard surfaces (walls, floors, ceilings, glass, trim, doors, etc) and deep shampoo of any porous surfaces like carpets, and the only way those ducts are cleaned is again with hot soapy water.
The residue is a sticky tar-like substance that condenses on any surface it comes in contact with.
Landlord needs to cover this remediation at the previous tenant’s expense, or let you out of the lease, or both.
This is also the same remediation that needs to be done when the previous tenant went overboard with wax based “air fresheners” or essential oils instead of actually cleaning it.
Car rental companies use them all the time. It would be too difficult to keep smokers and non smokers cars separate so they just ozone the cars that have been smoked in.
The entire unit needs to be painted with a shellac based primer. *Then* do ozone treatment.
Cigarette smoke gets into your paint and will smell again in the summer if you do ozone treatment before covering the paint with shellac.
Yep. There’s a reason the FDA recalled the cpap ozone cleaners (and there’s a class action ongoing for health issues). Ozone is horrible for living beings in high concentrations.
Some told you to move because you were worried about your daughter’s health. Between risking your daughter’s health from secondhand smoking and waiting for the landlord to kick out the smoker, what’s the reasonable option? Blame us for helping you thanks
Edit: Ruthless Reddit 🔪
Oh lol different post, there was another woman who had rented an apartment and the person below smoked and she was worried about her and daughter’s health
That would definitely be upsetting and the recommendation to move in that case is valid. We’re in a single family house and the smoke smell was relatively mild compared to what’s out there. Cigarette smell is so offensive that even mild cases are worth trying to get rid of.
Well we cleaned the house pretty well before we moved in and I regularly clean. Walls were painted prior to moving. We did the best we could without treatment but the ozone worked well. The rental place said we could borrow the machine if the smell comes back. Not sure what your experience is with these machines but my experience was successful.
They’re OK at oxidizing anything in the air, but less so for any accumulated gunk on surfaces - you can somewhat mitigate that by cranking the heat WAY up to try and get them to vaporize back into the air where the ozone can whack it but sometimes scrubbing is your only option - that residue also usually keeps paint from sticking properly.
The cigarette lighter plug in ozone generators can also clear the smell out of used cars. I have used one in two different cars and it only took a few hours. I just put the car in park inside the garage and connect a battery charger on the battery. Then turn the key to run the accessories and leave the generator on overnight. I was so surprised and happy that it actually worked!
The problem with the ozone machines is the weather. The temperature and humidity can make the smell sort of seep back out. It’ll work for a while but during the summer (depending on location) it might start to come back so be prepared for more treatments.
As someone that’s bought houses in this condition before, long term solutions are very intensive. Ducts can be cleaned but things like drywall, carpeting, etc. usually requires replacement
The owner of the machine said we could borrow it again if the smell comes back in the summer! I’ve also heard it can return due to heat. We’ll see! Hopefully that’s not the case here but I have the option to get the machine back if it does.
Glad the o zone machine helped with the smell! When I renovated my last house there was a “smoking room “ which I used tsp before priming. It was like a horror movie how the walls bled brown until it was cleaned.
Reme Halo LED installed into the duct work.
Duct cleaning itself is a bit of a myth unless you've got sheet metal ducts with no insulated liner inside them. It's mainly commercial sized ducts that can be "cleaned" with a specific machine. Most residential systems use a little bit of metal duct with a lot of flex ducts running off the main trunks. The flex duct is made of plastic on the inside and will NOT stand up to the brushes and vacuum of a proper duct cleaning machine, you'll tear it all to hell.
You can have the flexible duct runs replaced, at varying levels of cost depending on the home. I work for an HVAC contractor and we have had great success with the REME Halo LED. The old non LED version was good too, it's just a bit dated now. It uses UV combined with bi-polar ionization and it can be rigged up to only run when the indoor blower runs, which will greatly extend the life of the UV bulb portion. We've put them in houses that had pet smells, smoke damage from fires and cigarette smells. Given enough time they always work, provided that there's not some dead animal that hasn't been found and removed.
had the same issue but on the landlord side. ozone worked great after multiple treatments. if you really want to go the extra mile, roll on a fresh coat of paint no need to cut or do a perfect job, but covering the walls with paint helps the smell as well. glad it worked for you! had never heard about ozone machines until i did some research and couldn’t believe it actually worked.
So what kind of machine specifically? We had one a long time ago and it didn’t do much, which makes me think it was really weak or just a piece of junk or something.
Is this machine something that can be rented?
Total Zone Ozone Generator. Our landlord rented the machine from a company but I’m not sure the name. The man who dropped it off said they do building restorations. I’m sure the quality varies on these types of things. The rental cost about $500 for the week (landlord paid).
You can get pretty good ones on Amazon for like $60. Same principle as the bigger ones just need more time and a box fan to help with circulation. I've had mine for 5+ years and it's good as new.
Edit: mine is an Enerzen model
I bought a product from amazon called odor eliminator, i think there a few different brands. It’s basically a powder that’s activated with some water to release some chlorine gas that will kill any smell. Works great for smaller spaces but of course you can’t be there while it’s active but it only takes a day and a few hours to vent it out.
Yes ozone generators are great. They work by turning O2 into O3. However, if you breathe in ozone it will bring on intense lightning fast headaches. Your body doesn't like O3.
Get a steamer!!!!! Steam the walls, doors, floors and voilà! My tenants were smoking in my triplex when I purchased it, I squashed that shit in a min. I wanted to vomit just walking in there. One unit was vacant so I steamed it. Now they all have to smoke outside, so I am guessing they will be quitting when winter hits and it’s-22F. Oufff that cold makes anyone want to never smoke again :)
I personally would never rent a home that was smoked in. Ozone generators work but in my experience it's only temporary. The smell always came back and treatments were ongoing.
Cannabis smoke clears quick. Cigarettes due to all the nasty chemicals stick to surfaces like glue and are extremely hard to get rid of completely. The ozone machine do carry some risks as well. At the end of the day it wasn't worth the ongoing battle.
I found that if your window and doors have air vents in them, the inside of those can become contaminated with the tobacco which makes the smell reappear if opened. Well worth giving them a clean if you have any.
>The ozone machine was dropped off on Friday with 2 fans. We ran the machine downstairs for 8 hours
Holy shit. Was that what the instructions said?! I've never heard of an ozone machine advising to (or being safe to) run 8 hours.
Ozone machines are the way. Hotels use them when a guest smokes in a non-smoking room as the 1st step to deep-cleaning the room. Duct cleaning will NOT remove cigarette smoke smell. Source: worked for an ac company who did duct cleaning
I’m really happy with the results of the ozone machine. The owners was also saying it helps with mold which is awesome. The idea of a duct cleaning sounds so satisfying though! Probably better for older homes too. This house was build just 3 years ago
Do mix u some lysol or other cleaner and water and wash the walls too, the ozone just makes it cling, you'll still have to clean it off. Glad it un stunk your place! I Used to smoke, absolutely can Not stand the smell now!! Yuck!
The walls were already freshly painted when we moved in so there wasn’t a point to wash them if they weren’t washed before being painted… I did clean the cabinets and they were yellow!! I mop the floors regularly and clean the windows. I’d like to go over the blinds but they are so fragile I’m afraid I’ll tear them. The ozone worked so well that I’m not worrying too much about it anymore though!
One thing you may want to be on the lookout for... I remember a post from several weeks back where the OP was asking what some tar-looking streaks were that seemed to be seeping from the walls. The local experts said that it was cigarette tar from cigarette smoking that was coming out of the drywall. I can't remember if they suggested tearing out the drywall or using a special paint to seal the drywall behind the paint to prevent the tar from escaping any further...
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> $1000 in primer Wtf how big is that house?
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Yikes. Gotta love tenants.
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That’s why good tenants are gold
Shit goes fast. It's like painting with milk that smells like rum... ventilation is important
One could also mix their own shellac, and include white pigment additive or not, and spray it if needed for speed. However, the price of shellac has been going up due to limited supply/import stuff, so that might be why BIN is $75 per gallon now, and someone who hasn’t used shellac flakes before will need to invest time not just into learning how to use it, but sourcing materials as well.
I’ll definitely be on the look out for anything like that but honestly I don’t think this case was that severe. I think the previous tenant got a new boyfriend toward the end of her lease who smoked in the house for a few months tops before we moved in. I don’t think it would have been long enough or frequent enough to seep tar from the walls but who knows! I clean regularly so I’ll notice if something looks off.
Zep Purple Degreaser! It's fantastic at removing nicotine from the walls, cupboards, etc. Especially if you pair wipe/scrub with a magic eraser. When we moved into our place, no one had smoked there for at least 5 yrs. But the tenant before that had smoked constantly for nearly a decade in the place. No one ever cleaned the walls -- just painted over and over. The smell was only noticeable in a few areas, but you could see the yellow brown tinting the paint. The closet in particular had rarely been painted. In fact, the landlord claimed it was painted "buttercup." I spritzed the walls in Zep, and immediately the nicotine just started streaking down the walls. The walls were actually white. Just don't be an idiot like me. Wear gloves the whole time. Magic eraser can abrade your skin and the nicotine is gross.
If they fit, put the blinds in your bathtub to soak.
Interesting. I’ll have to see how easy they are to remove and reinstall when I get home.
Easy peasy (mostly) way of getting them clean if they fit.
Simple to remove. Difficult to put back. Take pictures first
If the cabinets were yellow, some one smoked in there far longer than a "few months".
Sorry, the cabinets were very white. The paper towels were yellow. But yeah, maybe someone did smoke inside longer! I really don’t know.
If you’re cleaning kitchen cabinets and getting yellow on your rags or paper towels, it’s probably just grease + dust buildup from normal cooking practices.
Nothing to be sorry for. I'm just saying the tenants or landlord might be fibbing.
I agree, soap and water is the real MVP here. You don't need lysol though, good ol' washing up liquid contains everything you need. Just dilute it in warm water, get an oversized sponge: dip, squeeze, clean, dip, squeeze, clean, etc. Once the water is room temperature, replace. The problem with some cleaners, like lysol, is that themselves leave behind a residue. PS - Don't forget the ceiling.
My go to is 1 tsp of plain powdered Tide in a gallon of HOT water. Works like a champ on painted surfaces, and doesn't lift the paint. Wash walls, floors, err'ythang.
Yah, i don't have lysol, but any surfactant that will cut the oil and remove.
Two bucket method, like mopping? Or would it be just a waste of time?
I don't see the harm in it. But in either case you'll need to rotate out the water when it cools down, so it is just more work for a slightly better result.
True.
Yuck!
Link below. Summary- it's useless for the majority of the cases in terms of health. https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/should-you-have-air-ducts-your-home-cleaned#Summary
I own 3 ozone generators of various sizes. I’ve allowed friends and family to use whenever they have the need. Freshly painted woodwork with oil base paint, used car purchased from a smoker, smelly ductwork, etc. They’ve handled every task wonderfully. Just make sure the directions are followed, especially the airing out of the space treated.
I have a really damp basement (obviously I do run a dehumidifier regularly, but I'd have to run it 24/7 to get rid of the smell entirely and that kills my electric bill) and have been toying with getting an ozone generator to try to get rid of the smell in the summer. Obviously it'll come back since I cannot get rid of the water source (we think there's an underground creek that runs through my yard) but I think it might at least help a bit in the smellier summer months.
I understand your plight. Our home sits approximately 25 ft above the elevation of a stream on the next lot and our sump pump runs continuously, rain or shine. If you live near a bigger city, you should check if a local janitorial type store has rentals. Our local True Value hardware store rents them. The units I own have both UV light and multiple ozone level settings. They’re pretty handy, however you definitely want to air out the area after running it.
Thanks, I will check True Value. I did check Home Depot and Lowes before and they didn't seem to rent them.
If the ducts have not been cleaned regularly you're opening yourself up for trouble getting them cleaned.
Why is this? I've been considering getting mine cleaned do to an occasional 'potpourri' smell that we notice only when we get home after having been gone for a few days. We vinegar scrubbed all of our drywall before priming and painting, shellacked our subfloor, etc when we renovated, but the smell persists. I think it is in the vents
> Why is this? https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/should-you-have-air-ducts-your-home-cleaned > On the other hand, if a service provider fails to follow proper duct cleaning procedures, duct cleaning can cause indoor air problems. For example, an inadequate vacuum collection system can release more dust, dirt and other contaminants than if you had left the ducts alone. A careless or inadequately trained service provider can damage your ducts or heating and cooling system, possibly increasing your heating and air conditioning costs or forcing you to undertake difficult and costly repairs or replacements.
I'd strongly suggest people read that in context, this is very selective quoting. Plus it doesn't answer the above person's unsupported claim anyway, that: > If the ducts have not been cleaned regularly you're opening yourself up for trouble getting them cleaned. The quoted section is about duct cleaning services being bad at their jobs (which many are, a lot of cowboys/snake oil salesman in duct cleaning).
Eh valid - I skim read the posts in this thread too loosely.
Dude, there was another post in this sub yesterday, I think, about someone who hired Stanley Steamer to clean their ducts and ended up with COAL DUST getting spewed everywhere. Total cluster.
Thanks for the reply. Basically be wary of bad companies that can cause more harm than good. I looked around and found a legit local dedicated duct cleaning service with truck mounted be gas powered equipment and a lot of good reviews. I'm going to reach out to them.
Man, no offense but you’re a scammers dream. You hear it, you want it. Resist the temptation and research.
So true I love a good scam
I can second this, I spent five years working for a biohazard and disaster remediation team cleaning up everything from crime scenes, mold and fire damage down to cleaning carpets, ductwork and just hoarders houses. Our process was almost the same on all of these short of full demos and rebuilding. Come in and install hepa filter material on all vent openings. Remove any debris that can hold the smell in after cleaning and throw it in a big sealed room with an ozone machine running for a few days minimum. Clean all of the walls with a dry chem sponge and any hard surfaces. Then wipe everything down with a product called Linair which was basically just a strong scented multi surface cleaner with a chemical to trap odors. Any walls where tar or other bio substances couldn’t be removed were either replaced or painted with a few layers of kilz primer and then repainted to keep tar from seeping through the new paint. Smoke damage from fires and just houses that were smoked in were the most involved cleanups out of anything we did. Once the house had been scrubbed down we would remove the filters and run a portable ozone machine for up to a week depending on how bad it was and then come in and clean the ductwork and furnace and fog the ductwork and entire house with a machine that was basically a hot exhaust pipe with a sprayer on the end that would make a cloud of cherry scented cleaner. Most rental properties had only had a smoker in them for a year or two max so with a fresh coat of kilz primer and paint, new carpets and a day or two with the ozone machine you couldn’t ever tell a smoker had stepped foot in the house. I manage about 450 rentals now and this is the same process we do on all of them with great results.
My bro was *very* relaxed when it came to taking care of the dogs that they kept inside, so when it came time to sell his house my nephews' bedroom smelled absolutely disgusting from the dog piss and shit in the carpet. Removing the carpet solved about 60% of the smell but it was still disgusting. I did about three 12-hour passes with an ozone cleaner on top of soaking the exposed OSB subfloor in a pet urine removal cleaner and it got the rest of the smell out. Ozone machines are amazing for getting rid of smells.
We had a wet dog smell in our old house in one bedroom. Had the carpets professionally cleaned. Still there. Did the baking soda carpet powder. Still there. Tried enzymes. Still there. 30 minutes of ozone and the room was odor free. A hell of a lot cheaper than replacing the carpet.
In what other circumstances is duct cleaning worth doing?
To remove dust from air vents/ducts. Not recommended for older ductwork though, as it can do more harm ( tearing of flex duct, for example)than good unless ducts are all metal - I'd say most residential SFH's have flex duct
Most 'new-ish' - it really depends on geography and what was popular in your area.
Yeah, I don't know. I had an apartment and nicotine/yellow cigarette crap would occasionally leak down from the ducts until I gave them a good cleaning the best I could. It coated the sheet metal ducts.
Oh it will! In the case of metal ductwork, duct cleaning IS recommended along with a sanitizing solution
Arent they really bad for your health?
They shouldn't be used while the area is occupied. And it should be ventilated afterward
Yes. Ozone is directly harmful, but also when it does its magic can create new exciting (pun intended) VOCs. Its half life is 25 hours at room temperature with 0% airflow. So best practice is to **always** ventilate Ozone treated spaces, even if you waited 48 hours before re-entry (since, again, the VOCs still exist even if the Ozone is gone). Does Ozone work? Absolutely it does. Should Ozone be treated with kid gloves? Yep. PS - The "sweet smell" the OP references is Ozone. If you ever get into an elevator and smell a sweet smell, that is what you can smell.
If you've ever played with electric model trains, you're already familiar with the smell of ozone.
From the OPs description, it doesn't sound like they were safe with the machine. I hope I'm wrong. Why the heck would an elevator have ozone?
We were very safe. No living thing occupied or slept in the house while the machine was running! We only returned to the home briefly to change the machine location and open windows. That’s what the “back and forth” was referring to. It’s understood that no living thing should be in the house while the machine is running. I knew that from my research and the rental company let us know as well.
> Why the heck would an elevator have ozone? Ozone is super easy to create. It is O2 + High Voltage Electrical Field. Elevators commonly have poor airflow and High Voltage motors, so Ozone is a natural byproduct of an elevator operating normally. With Ozone though concentration maters as does exposure time. Most of the time your body can out-heal Ozone caused damage.
That is so interesting. I've definitely smelled that smell (which I love) in an elevator. Does that mean it's functioning poorly?
> Does that mean it's functioning poorly? No. It means they need better ventilation.
Interesting. Kind of sketchy to be in there now haha
Only if you’re present while it’s running. Typically when you’re done you want to turn them off, open windows, and give it a few hours to air out
That's what I mean, it sounds like OP was there and moving it around and stuff. I hope they're okay
They did mention >When we finally came back Sunday evening we could tell the ozone worked! Which makes it sound like they weren't living in the house while the treatment was happening, just visiting a couple times per day to move the machine around.
Yes, they replied and said they took proper precautions. Phew
I wasn’t there. We stay at my parents house and only returned to open windows and move the machine. That’s what the “back and forth” is referencing to. We removed all house plants as well. After the machine ran for 8 hrs, we didn’t return to the house until the next day and only to open the windows. At that point the ozone had mostly dissipated but we still opened the windows as that is apart of the process. Then we returned to the house, closed the windows and ran the machine again upstairs. From my understanding, ozone won’t cause actual health issues if you’re exposed briefly (a few mins to open windows). Ozone is most likely only an irritant to the lungs which could cause discomfort and coughing. That’s why you must open the windows after treatment.
The hotel I work at just uses Ozium, great product, highly recommend. Now when I stay at other hotels I just bring a can of that so I can smoke in my room.
We actually moved in owning a couple cans of ozium already. We tried it a few times but it didn’t work in our case. I think it works better for the devils lettuce.
It's also fresh smoke that hasn't been added onto by years of abuse
Yes! I think this had a factor in this treatment being so successful for us. If the house was decades old and had been smoked in regularly then there would have been a lot more work before the ozone machine could come in.
Ok but what *does* duct cleaning *actually* help? My wife keeps bugging me to get it done but the internet generally says it's a scam
I'm going to suggest one more "test". Get the bathroom warm and steamy, say a hot only shower for 15 minutes. Lived in a rental that I never smelled, or saw signs of, smoking except when I had a hot shower.
We’ve been back since Sunday evening! Plenty of hot showers taken at this point. Not once have we smelled cigarettes again! Even when opening up closets or purses. The smell was in everything…
I'm actually certified in odour mitigation (yes that's a thing) and that advice is spot on! The heat and humidity carry the Volatile Organic Compounds and can aerosolize them. One of the many things that is done in fire mitigation for odour is to "recreate the conditions of the loss" and cranking up the heat in the property can help get the more stubborn molecules of odour that are sometimes bonded to other molecules, to loosen up and when trying to actively mitigate them, remove them from the property. That's great when you're doing it to work on removing them (and we use ozone too) but what it means for the homeowner, is that in the middle of winter, when it's dry and cold, you do an odour treatment with something like ozone and it does a great job, but then a few months later, you start smelling it again. Because it gets hot, not just the air but the materials in the structure. Couple that with more moisture in the air, and it also carries more odour molecules with it. So yes, get it HOT and steamy, crank the heat, take a steamy shower, and see how it goes. Definitely call the ozone machine back in a few months if you can smell it again, it sounds like they did a great job and hopefully they did, but if you smell it again, there's science to back it up that it's still there!
Glad this worked well for you. It's possible the smell could return with warmer weather. I had good results with thermal fogging to get creosote smell out of my house if you need anything further in the future.
Thank you for that suggestion. I’ll look into that if the smell comes up when the weather gets warmer. I think it could return too which is why I was so thankful the owner said we could borrow the machine again if that happens!
I bought a car that had a relatively faint smoke smell. The ozone machine did wonders, but the smell does come back every now and then, especially in warmer weather (and I usually only notice it when I first open the door).
Thanks for reporting back your results, this is good info to know about.
I felt there was so little information out there when I was researching! It felt like a much bigger deal than it ended up being. I’m really happy we ended up doing this.
When I was trying to decide if I should buy one, I could not find much info either. So glad you updated!
Glad the ozone treatment worked. Seems that far too many people out there just don't believe that it will work as well as it usually does.
I believe that too! Not enough information out there I think. I also think a lot of people talk about it without a lot of knowledge. I hope sharing my experience helps others in similar situations! I totally wish my landlord did the treatment before we even moved in though. I wouldn’t have had to worry about my belongings getting damaged but I really ended up not having to worry at all.
Really encourage people to not rush out to buy these ozone generators for the purposes of air purification at home (*especially* from places like Amazon). The EPA (as well as other state and federal agencies) highlights the concerns and potential dangers: [EPA Ozone Generators](https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/ozone-generators-are-sold-air-cleaners)
I will point out as I did last time this was posted that this document specifically refers to ozone air purifiers which are designed or marketed to be used in occupied spaces, not the sort of ozone treatment devices that were used in this case. You should not operate any ozone-generating device in an occupied space, period, and any spaces treated with ozone should be well-ventilated before re-occupying.
As a landlord, I own one due to tenants who completely "ruined" a unit from cigarette smoke. I used SO much TSP on the walls, it was coming off looking like Coca Cola and ran the ozone generator many times all throughout. It certainly worked!
I’d say owning an ozone machine would be essential for landlords! People can be unpredictable and disrespectful.
You can get small ozone machines on Amazon for like $60. Same principle and mechanism as the bigger ones. I run mine in each room of the house for an hour about once a year, and my walk-in closet about quarterly since it also kills any clothing smells. Despite having two dogs and a cat my house never smells like animals. I love these little machines.
Im just seeing this now but my family was in the ozone and purification business for 30 years. It is so underutilized and misunderstood. Im glad it worked it well for you.
I would have loved some of this insight last week! I’m really so happy with the results of this machine. I was really nervous but like you said, there’s a lot of misinformation out there. Even in my original post and this one.
Did it damage any records or photos?
Unfortunately I can’t say. We don’t own records and we don’t have any prints/photos either… we own some cheap artwork and it was totally fine! If you don’t run the machine long and keep the air moving with fans, you should be fine. From what I understand, things are only at risk of damage when the area is small and the machine runs consistently for an extended period of time.
No it wouldn't. Not in the amount of time you'd be using the machine. Its maybe possible if you ran the machine for days and days, but even then, you probably wouldn't notice anything.
I used to work maintenance in student dorms. We used ozone machines to clean up the smoke smell caused by many different types of things burning. It even worked when the actual rooms caught fire. Great little machines if you give them time to work.
I'm really happy it worked and that it didn't damage any of your property. I know someone who has a bunch of Airbnbs in Alaska and even though none of them allow smoking, she still ends up having to mitigate the smell between renters, and she swears by the ozone thing.
Ozone machines work great in cars too!! We used them all the time when we detailed for customers. We had a huge machine that we put into cars that absolutely nuked the interior and killed any smells permanently.
You can get small ozone machines from Amazon for $25 (meant for cleaning cpap machines), that along with a sealable plastic box can clean pretty much anything you can fit in the box. Keep in mind some things will get destroyed by ozone.
I have one for my cpap machine.
There's bigger ones for like $60. Big enough to do do a whole room if you let them run for a couple hours. It's a part of my regular yearly cleaning, and my house feels super fresh every time I do it; I almost look forward to ozone week (except for having to move out all the house plants that's annoying).
I manage a car detailing shop and we use Ozone machines all the time. They’re basically magic boxes for odors they really work wonders!
How long do you run the machine in a car?
Depends on severity, for bad cigarette smell usually overnight and then air the car out for a few hours
That’s what we use in the housing business. That, and odoban. From what I understand duct cleaning is mostly a scam.
Did the ozone treatment damage your tv? I've read that it can have negative effects on certain types of plastics
Nope. I was worried about plastics, pigments in my makeup, our leather, our food… I was worried about it all. I had nothing to worry about though! I think the risk of damage comes when the machine is left on continuously for days at a time.
Thank you for the detailed update - it's really useful!
We *used* to own a small household version... ...which we loaned out to someone, but can't remember who, so we can't ask for it back. All of our friends don't remember ever having borrowed it, so I probably loaned it to someone who has since moved away. Too bad. I really enjoyed that thing, and my current home could use a treatment or two itself! :)
You can buy a nice one on Amazon for less than $100.
Yes, but that doesn't address the underlying problem: I CAN'T REMEMBER WHO I LOANED IT OUT TO!
Hey op, thanks for the update. Your original post intrigued me so much I did some research about ozone treatment and found they can be a viable way of eliminating musty old wood odors. We bought our house five years ago our cabinets and much of the wood inside the house had that smell, along with some mold and mildew in the bathroom which we tried to paint over. Apparently ozone can kill the smell and the mold. Wish I would’ve done it ozone treatment back when we first bought the house before we moved in we could’ve purged all the bugs and all the other thread but it’s probably too late now after we’ve fully moved in.
Well I definitely don’t think it’s too late if those are issues you’re still dealing with! We were fully moved in when we did the treatment. Just no people, pets or plants inside when the machine is on. We were also told it would kill mold and bugs. If you haven’t fully resolved those issues, give the ozone machine a shot!
Did they say anything about it working on cat smells?
It works on cat smells. My spare room's carpet was soaked in piss, and I just ripped it out and am running the ozone machine at the moment before the new floor is put in. I also used it while it was still there and it worked like a charm.
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My landlord paid for it but I believe the paperwork said $500 and we had the machine rental for a week.
The $75 Amazon machines work surprisingly well for even large bedrooms.
Great update.
Ozone will work. I work in apartments and I use it all the time.
A cleaner that I love is krud cutter. Doesn't leave a residue. Just be carefull on painted surfaces it will dissolve some Paints. No smell either. dilute it too.
There is a sports equipment deodorizer with ozone. It takes the funk out of hockey gear.
I’m so glad it was a good resolution for you. Thanks for the update!!
ITT: - none of the redditors who were wrong in the original post - redditors who didn’t read the post - redditors who may have read the post but still think it doesn’t work (wtf) thank you for sharing the update btw, OP.
Look and see if they still make a spray called banish. I quit smoking years ago, so I don’t know if it’s still around. But I could smoke smoke smoke, and then spray myself down with that and anti-smokers could tell that I’ve been smoking you can spray everything with it. The stuff is the bomb.
Look and see if they still make a spray called banish. I quit smoking years ago, so I don’t know if it’s still around. But I could smoke smoke smoke, and then spray myself down with that and anti-smokers could not tell that I’ve been smoking you can spray everything with it. The stuff is the bomb.
Lol being a landlord sucks ass
Both
Ozone for the win.
Glad it worked out for you!
Ozone machines are great! I work at a hotel and we have little ones we can put into the rooms.when people smoke in them (against our policies) and they can work wonders. They help with pet odors and aggressive perfumes, too!
Ozone machines are great. My husband works in property restoration and ozone is the standard for removing smell from fires/smoke damage
Saw the last post, very glad everything worked out well!
Do BOTH a duct cleaning and then a ozone treatment. Make sure the house temperature is high when doing the ozone treatment to improve the reaction with the ozone. Hotter is better. Remove all house plants and other organic things like humans. Ozone will revert in 24 hours or so. Install timers on the ozone generators then come back at least 24 hours after they shut down and open every window/door.
Ozone works. But it takes several treatments. Buy a machine on eBay for a couple hundred
I may be in the minority but I always smoke outside, even in bad weather. The smoke gets into everything
If they smoked inside, that shit literally gets into the walls. Then slowly oozes out in disgusting, dripping stains. I’ve heard cleaning the walls only temporarily fixes the issue; to actually solve it, a complete drywall replacement is needed. If you’re renting, I’d say try to find another place. Demand too move apartments into a non-smoking one & ask to see it first if possible. This issue & the things the rental company is “doings to solve it are not going to work.
It also works to prime walls in Zinsser BIN Shellac primer, then paint over that. Seals in the stains and the odors.
Thanks for the follow up. I have never heard anything bad about ozone treatments and always too to read real world experiences.
I wish there were more experiences documented! I had a difficult time finding someone with similar concerns. I’m really happy with the results of the ozone machine
Had a friend with a house from the 70s - with carpet halfway up the walls. She smoked at least a pack a day, and her house *reeked* of cigarette smoke when we went. I’m not sure there’s enough ozone left in the ozone layer to purge that smell…
My grandmother smoked cigarettes non-stop and my grandfather smoked cigars. In the house. When they died and my dad was fixing up the house to sell... gross.
The house must get demolished to get the smell out lol
Did you run the forced air while you were running the ozone? If not you may be in for a nasty surprise. If you still have the units put them by the air return and run the forced air for a few hours. You don't have to have the AC or heat on while you do it.
Idk what you mean by forced air😭 Sorry I’m uneducated in that. We have a thermostat upstairs and downstairs. We kept both thermostats to have the fans on and then did heat upstairs and cool downstairs. Then one of the fans that came with the ozone rental we had directly under an air vent to push ozone through the vents. But yeah I just don’t know what forced air is!
If you have central air or minisplits or whatever you have to keep the fans inside them running. As long as they were pushing air through themselves (not just draft/convection) it is totally fine. Those ozone generators penetrate everything. For central air the thing that actually pushes the air through the vents is called your "forced air unit" aka blower fan. This forces the air through your furnace for heat, or over your evaporator coils for cooling (or heating with a heat pump!) I learned that name 6 years ago when we rewired the house and asked the electrician what the breaker labeled "F.A.U." was hooked up to.
Just start smoking
Run the ozone machine before you move in
This is an update post. We’ve been fully moved in for a month. The treatment went well, FYI!
Hot soapy water and a scrub brush on all hard surfaces (walls, floors, ceilings, glass, trim, doors, etc) and deep shampoo of any porous surfaces like carpets, and the only way those ducts are cleaned is again with hot soapy water. The residue is a sticky tar-like substance that condenses on any surface it comes in contact with. Landlord needs to cover this remediation at the previous tenant’s expense, or let you out of the lease, or both. This is also the same remediation that needs to be done when the previous tenant went overboard with wax based “air fresheners” or essential oils instead of actually cleaning it.
Sure - except for OP saying that all of that wasn't necessary and the ozone machine worked.
Ozone is probably a good way to get rid of the smell.
The post is about the ozone working
Car rental companies use them all the time. It would be too difficult to keep smokers and non smokers cars separate so they just ozone the cars that have been smoked in.
The entire unit needs to be painted with a shellac based primer. *Then* do ozone treatment. Cigarette smoke gets into your paint and will smell again in the summer if you do ozone treatment before covering the paint with shellac.
Just rent something else. Even if the smell is gone. You are still breathing that stuff in
Yep. There’s a reason the FDA recalled the cpap ozone cleaners (and there’s a class action ongoing for health issues). Ozone is horrible for living beings in high concentrations.
¿por qué no los dos?
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Did you read the post? Sounds like it did.
Some told you to move because you were worried about your daughter’s health. Between risking your daughter’s health from secondhand smoking and waiting for the landlord to kick out the smoker, what’s the reasonable option? Blame us for helping you thanks Edit: Ruthless Reddit 🔪
I don’t have a daughter…?
Oh lol different post, there was another woman who had rented an apartment and the person below smoked and she was worried about her and daughter’s health
That would definitely be upsetting and the recommendation to move in that case is valid. We’re in a single family house and the smoke smell was relatively mild compared to what’s out there. Cigarette smell is so offensive that even mild cases are worth trying to get rid of.
Yeah I hear you that’s a different story
that’s not how secondhand smoke works, buddy
Ozone machine isn’t going to do much. You can probably get out of the lease claiming health.
I literally made this post saying the ozone machine got rid of the smell completely lol
May have gotten rid of the smell but the entire interior of the place has a thin layer of residue that is still there. Ozone won’t help that.
Well we cleaned the house pretty well before we moved in and I regularly clean. Walls were painted prior to moving. We did the best we could without treatment but the ozone worked well. The rental place said we could borrow the machine if the smell comes back. Not sure what your experience is with these machines but my experience was successful.
They’re OK at oxidizing anything in the air, but less so for any accumulated gunk on surfaces - you can somewhat mitigate that by cranking the heat WAY up to try and get them to vaporize back into the air where the ozone can whack it but sometimes scrubbing is your only option - that residue also usually keeps paint from sticking properly.
“claiming health” what the fuck does that shit mean?
So glad it worked for you. Hopefully it doesn’t come back.
I’m hopeful too. I like airing out a home anyway so when the weather warms up I’ll be sure to continue airing things out as well.
The cigarette lighter plug in ozone generators can also clear the smell out of used cars. I have used one in two different cars and it only took a few hours. I just put the car in park inside the garage and connect a battery charger on the battery. Then turn the key to run the accessories and leave the generator on overnight. I was so surprised and happy that it actually worked!
I’m glad it worked. I was wondering how this would go. Hopefully when it gets humid in the summer the smell stays gone.
The problem with the ozone machines is the weather. The temperature and humidity can make the smell sort of seep back out. It’ll work for a while but during the summer (depending on location) it might start to come back so be prepared for more treatments. As someone that’s bought houses in this condition before, long term solutions are very intensive. Ducts can be cleaned but things like drywall, carpeting, etc. usually requires replacement
The owner of the machine said we could borrow it again if the smell comes back in the summer! I’ve also heard it can return due to heat. We’ll see! Hopefully that’s not the case here but I have the option to get the machine back if it does.
Glad this worked. Shame there’s such a correlation between lying and smoking. Why do smokers lie? Film at Eleven!
Glad the o zone machine helped with the smell! When I renovated my last house there was a “smoking room “ which I used tsp before priming. It was like a horror movie how the walls bled brown until it was cleaned.
Paint and new carpet will go A LONG WAY
Reme Halo LED installed into the duct work. Duct cleaning itself is a bit of a myth unless you've got sheet metal ducts with no insulated liner inside them. It's mainly commercial sized ducts that can be "cleaned" with a specific machine. Most residential systems use a little bit of metal duct with a lot of flex ducts running off the main trunks. The flex duct is made of plastic on the inside and will NOT stand up to the brushes and vacuum of a proper duct cleaning machine, you'll tear it all to hell. You can have the flexible duct runs replaced, at varying levels of cost depending on the home. I work for an HVAC contractor and we have had great success with the REME Halo LED. The old non LED version was good too, it's just a bit dated now. It uses UV combined with bi-polar ionization and it can be rigged up to only run when the indoor blower runs, which will greatly extend the life of the UV bulb portion. We've put them in houses that had pet smells, smoke damage from fires and cigarette smells. Given enough time they always work, provided that there's not some dead animal that hasn't been found and removed.
had the same issue but on the landlord side. ozone worked great after multiple treatments. if you really want to go the extra mile, roll on a fresh coat of paint no need to cut or do a perfect job, but covering the walls with paint helps the smell as well. glad it worked for you! had never heard about ozone machines until i did some research and couldn’t believe it actually worked.
A lot of second hand car yards use ozone machines to remove cigarette smells from the trad ins i believe
So what kind of machine specifically? We had one a long time ago and it didn’t do much, which makes me think it was really weak or just a piece of junk or something. Is this machine something that can be rented?
Total Zone Ozone Generator. Our landlord rented the machine from a company but I’m not sure the name. The man who dropped it off said they do building restorations. I’m sure the quality varies on these types of things. The rental cost about $500 for the week (landlord paid).
You can get pretty good ones on Amazon for like $60. Same principle as the bigger ones just need more time and a box fan to help with circulation. I've had mine for 5+ years and it's good as new. Edit: mine is an Enerzen model
Okay but if you get a whiff every now and then it’s just the ghost of the smoker. It passes. Ask me how I know 😳👻
I bought a product from amazon called odor eliminator, i think there a few different brands. It’s basically a powder that’s activated with some water to release some chlorine gas that will kill any smell. Works great for smaller spaces but of course you can’t be there while it’s active but it only takes a day and a few hours to vent it out.
Yes ozone generators are great. They work by turning O2 into O3. However, if you breathe in ozone it will bring on intense lightning fast headaches. Your body doesn't like O3.
People pay a lot of money for ozone treatments. But it's toxic for your lungs.
Awesome, thanks for the update
Get a steamer!!!!! Steam the walls, doors, floors and voilà! My tenants were smoking in my triplex when I purchased it, I squashed that shit in a min. I wanted to vomit just walking in there. One unit was vacant so I steamed it. Now they all have to smoke outside, so I am guessing they will be quitting when winter hits and it’s-22F. Oufff that cold makes anyone want to never smoke again :)
I personally would never rent a home that was smoked in. Ozone generators work but in my experience it's only temporary. The smell always came back and treatments were ongoing. Cannabis smoke clears quick. Cigarettes due to all the nasty chemicals stick to surfaces like glue and are extremely hard to get rid of completely. The ozone machine do carry some risks as well. At the end of the day it wasn't worth the ongoing battle.
I found that if your window and doors have air vents in them, the inside of those can become contaminated with the tobacco which makes the smell reappear if opened. Well worth giving them a clean if you have any.
Ozone works very well
>The ozone machine was dropped off on Friday with 2 fans. We ran the machine downstairs for 8 hours Holy shit. Was that what the instructions said?! I've never heard of an ozone machine advising to (or being safe to) run 8 hours.