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Paul

I had to park the 931 outside over the winter (wife wanted her car in the garage). The front suspension and the ENTIRE drivetrain was stored in the garage.

I covered it wiith a water resistant car cover when I parked it.

Upon uncovering it to move it back into garage, I noticed the seats and many other parts are GREEN with mold and the car is basically "steamed up". Water drops are dripping off the headliner, the carpet is soaked....

I pulled it into the garage and removed the sunroof and opened the hatch to let it begin to dry out.

Has anyone had to deal with this? Is the mold dangerous if it's inhaled while cleaning it? What's the best way to clean this up?

I'm really upset since the leather seats and interior were in really good shape when I parked it.
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White 87 924S "Ghost"
Silver 98 986 3.6l 320 HP "Frank N Stein"
White 01 986 "Christine"
Polar Silver 02 996TT. "Turbo"
Owned and repaired 924s since 1977
Porsche: It's not driving, it's therapy.

Rasta Monsta · Joined: 12 Jul 2006 Posts: 11733 Location: PacNW

Paul, that sucks. Mold can be dangerous to inhale if you are prone to allergies and asthma. I think a good steam cleaning will get most of it, the problem is that mold breaks down fabric, stitching, etc.

Good luck, sorry to hear this happened. Water sucks.
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Toofah King Bad

WeiBe (1987 924S 2.5t) - 931 S3

D Hook · Joined: 02 Nov 2002 Posts: 3158 Location: Omaha, NE

When I changed out my interior, I used a bleach solution on the floor boards and any of the low lying areas where water was likely to have puddled. Threw out the carpet completely. Bleached the padding. Let it sit and hosed it out. But I still had a mildew odor.

I sure yours' is salvageable though. You'll have to let it dry out; maybe add a fan to force the air into the nooks and under the seats. After it's dried a little you can pull the seats and maybe remove the covers. Any good upholstrey shop can give you an idea of how to treat the leather to save it. Maybe tell you how to best deal with the rest of the issues, too. I bet someone from the New Orleans area would have some valuable insight.

I'll need to do it again this summer because I got water in over the winter. Not nearly as bad as what you've described though. Man, that sucks.

Sorry to hear. That's gonna' play havoc with your electrics, too.
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'80 924 n/a SOLD

Paul · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:23 am Post subject:

Might be the final straw for an all original, never hit, 931S....

Parts anyone?
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White 87 924S "Ghost"
Silver 98 986 3.6l 320 HP "Frank N Stein"
White 01 986 "Christine"
Polar Silver 02 996TT. "Turbo"
Owned and repaired 924s since 1977
Porsche: It's not driving, it's therapy.

Rasta Monsta · Joined: 12 Jul 2006 Posts: 11733 Location: PacNW

Track car, anyone?
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Toofah King Bad

WeiBe (1987 924S 2.5t) - 931 S3

D Hook · Joined: 02 Nov 2002 Posts: 3158 Location: Omaha, NE

Paul · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:29 am Post subject:

5 lugs, sway bars front and back, freshly rebuilt (never installed) LSD snail shell, rebuilt turbo still in the box....
_________________
White 87 924S "Ghost"
Silver 98 986 3.6l 320 HP "Frank N Stein"
White 01 986 "Christine"
Polar Silver 02 996TT. "Turbo"
Owned and repaired 924s since 1977
Porsche: It's not driving, it's therapy.

D Hook · Joined: 02 Nov 2002 Posts: 3158 Location: Omaha, NE

What color is the interior?

(Vultures are gathering)

Calling dibs on the seats and the wheels.

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'80 924 n/a SOLD

Paul · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:35 am Post subject:

Green!! Was black.
_________________
White 87 924S "Ghost"
Silver 98 986 3.6l 320 HP "Frank N Stein"
White 01 986 "Christine"
Polar Silver 02 996TT. "Turbo"
Owned and repaired 924s since 1977
Porsche: It's not driving, it's therapy.

D Hook · Joined: 02 Nov 2002 Posts: 3158 Location: Omaha, NE

Paul · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 2:05 pm Post subject:

Any recommendations for buying a steam cleaner?
_________________
White 87 924S "Ghost"
Silver 98 986 3.6l 320 HP "Frank N Stein"
White 01 986 "Christine"
Polar Silver 02 996TT. "Turbo"
Owned and repaired 924s since 1977
Porsche: It's not driving, it's therapy.

D Hook · Joined: 02 Nov 2002 Posts: 3158 Location: Omaha, NE

Renting a small Hotsy might work, as Tom Cooper suggested.

He may have something in mind specifically. I'm not up on my steam cleaners.

Or maybe a residential carpet steam cleaning service.

Or maybe Service Masters? They do great work on mold/mildew problems, or so I hear.
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'80 924 n/a SOLD

Smoothie · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 2:29 pm Post subject:

I had something similar happen to a Cherokee that I left parked for a long time. It had the cardboard backed cloth headliner and the moisture/mold/mildew caused the fabric to seperate from the board, so it was hanging down everywhere. The interior also had a strong smell of mold/mildew and I found a puddle on the passenger side floor. Enough of that moisture had condensed on the insides of the windows to form large droplets. My mistake was leaving it so long with the windows rolled up tight. To remedy the situation I wet vacuumed up the puddle and put those top-of-window rain deflector shade things on the 4 side windows so I could leave it with the windows opened some in the future. I dried the inside of the windows of course, then put a mixture of bleach-water in a pan on the drivers side floor and let that evaporate in there with windows closed again to deal with the mildew. -Have replaced the bleach-water several times. It's about bearable now to sit in - still needs an engine, so it'll be sitting a little longer and getting more of the evaporated bleach-water treatments.
Definitely, if you want to work in it, wear a respirator - even if you don't have allergies/asthma because something like that might just overwhelm your system and cause allergies. I'd wear a respirator and give it a quick wet vacuuming, towel dry the rest, then let it sit closed-up for a while with a pan of bleach-water left on the floor to evaporate. -Or you might go with the bleach-water trick first before even going in to dry it.

I also occasionally use a bleach-water mixture in a spray bottle - spray that into both the fresh air intake and AC intake with fans running to try and kill off whatever might be growing inside the hvac system.
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"..it's made in Germany. You know the Germans always make good stuff."

'82 924T, US version, dark green metallic, 5 speed Audi 016G gearbox

Rasta Monsta · Joined: 12 Jul 2006 Posts: 11733 Location: PacNW

Shari says (Brooklyn accent):

"Paul, its leather, clean it!"
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Toofah King Bad

WeiBe (1987 924S 2.5t) - 931 S3

Benino · Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2007 3:41 pm Post subject:

wow sorry to hear that. That is frustrating.

It's a huge pain but I think you can salvage most everything.

The same thing didn't happen to me, but I hate waterproof covers for a different reason. my battery tray leaks in my 924 (in the process of getting that fixed now) so last time it started raining I went out and strapped a water proof tarp over the car. It rained over night and the sun came out the next day. I left the tarp on for 2 or 3 hot sunny days (driving 931 instead). BAD IDEA. Water steamed up between the cover and the paint. When I took the cover off the shiny paint had weird shaped spots and swirls of oxidation all over the hood and roof. I spent about 4 hours with rags and polishing compound making the sunroof shine again. Haven't tackled the rest. . .

I wont be leaving a waterproof cover on the car for any length of time again. :-/
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1980 Porsche 924 N/A USA
1980 Porsche 924 turbo USA
1987 Porsche 944S USA