In a moment of weakness, I stupidly paid for a ‘Valet’ when I left my car at Gatwick Airport car park.

Now the plastics and leather steering wheel are shiny and sticky, and the whole thing smells of soapy lemon cleaning products, like a cheap taxi.

Is there anything I can do to revert it to looking and smelling like a Volkswagen inside?

Ta.

missed a trick there binners…

😀

Yeah, my two dogs will doubtless take care of the lemon aroma pretty quickly.

It’s the shiny/sticky plastics I’m more bothered about – anything I can do to restore them to their showroom-matt finish?

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It’s the shiny/sticky plastics I’m more bothered about – anything I can do to restore them to their showroom-matt finish?.

Wet wipes.

Poorbiys World do a matt interior detailing spray. It smells of Marzipan though which can tend to make you peckish on long drives.

… am aiming to remove products, not add more of them 🙂

Could always try this…

Flash or other APC will clean most of the products off.
They may have hidden air fresheners under the seat etc

These…http://www.halfords.com/motoring/car-cleaning/interior-cleaning-vacuums/armor-all-car-dashboard-wipes-matt-finish-x-30?cm_mmc=Google+PLA-_-Car+Cleaning-_-Interior+Cleaning+&+Vacuums-_-281436&istCompanyId=b8708c57-7a02-4cf6-b2c0-dc36b54a327e&istItemId=lwmqiq&istBid=xztt&_$ja=tsid:94971|cid:865695745|agid:43902124775|tid:aud-297219199169:pla-330136202628|crid:202397318307|nw:g|rnd:3245218578419175360|dvc:t|adp:1o3|mt:|loc:9046727&gclid=CjwKCAiApJnRBRBlEiwAPTgmxAFGm22MZcPkFR7bOi-h6O53q6ioEYm_6aYT6DxceX1F4z1Zc6oxFxoCCEQQAvD_BwE
A Matt finish and nice smell, they just clean the insides of your car really well. Use them on mine and they are great.
Used on many works vehicles too

They may have hidden air fresheners under the seat etc

oh ffs <facepalm>

removing the cleaning products is going to be harder than it would’ve been to vacuum/clean the car myself.

lesson. learnt.

Yep, lesson learned.

Have your driver drop you off and collect you from the terminal from now on.

I reckon, bear with me..

That cleaning firm who did your car did it on a damp day and the cars not really been allowed to dry out proper like. You may find (if) the sun shines (ever again) that parking the car facing the sunlight the “sticky” might just dry out.
Might work, might not.

Have you called the company and asked “oi you lot, why so sticky maaaan”?

I’d rather have the cleaner smell than the unpleasant sweet/musty smell that seems to attach itself to Motability cars, along with wet dog and cigarettes!
In fact, I pilfer the air fresheners from cars I drive and use them to mask the smell in the stinky ones. The Jelly Belly ones seem to work best, but I’ll take a strong citrus smell every time, thanks, especially if I’m looking at a three-four hour drive home.

The simple answer is a weak solution of Fairy liquid. That’s got the plastics back to their original, non-shiny appearance, and the leather steering wheel now looks and feels like leather again, not cheap plastic.

Just in case you ever find yourself in the same situation.

Fair play to Hammerite for saying “Matt”, not “Matte”.

Autoglym Interioir Shampoo. Good stuff. Can be used on pretty much everything bar glass.
They do an odour killer spray too. Never used it but if anything like their other stuff should be good.

Take it back to the valet and say that you want the scent gone because you ordered ‘VW valet’, not ‘lemon valet’. Neither did you order ‘sticky valet’.

Or wipe it yourself with a hot damp cloth, once the frothing has died down 😉

Clean everything down with a good household cleaner in hot water with a dash of meths added or with glass cleaner. This will remove the silicon or whatever was in the valet spray as well as most of the aroma molecules in the perfume, although plastics do have the ability to absorb odour molecules to some extent – that’s how urinal mats work.

If you can remove whatever is holding the perfume, the good news is that citrus notes are quite volatile so the smell should evaporate quite fast.

that’s how urinal mats work

Every day is a school day 🙂