I ran into this situation more than a few times when I was doing sanitation at the warehouse. If you just mop using soap and water, you'll be there all day and still never get it all up.
First, scoop up as much of the oil as you can, then sprinkle a generous amount of cornmeal to soak up the coating on the floor, then sweep, repeat steps 2 and 3, then mop.
That is some good advice! I remember a while back you advised to put sugar on spilled concrete, another good tip.
ReplyDeletewould clay cat litter work as well?
ReplyDeleteNo. Cat litter gums up, clumps and leaves a residue that's hard to get up. Stick with the cornmeal, it takes half the work and a quarter of the time.
DeleteYour insights are vastly appreciated!
Delete-Bert
I cooked dough nuts for Walmart for about a year. One night another cook forgot to transfer the hot oil into a tank before dumping the cooker. A mess. Me being a smart guy said, "Hazmat uses cat litter for small spills." Yes, the cat litter soaked up everything. and left globs of wet litter. No a problem, said I. We'll scrape it into this big floor drain here. Came back that night and found out the bakery manager had to call a plumber to unstick the drain. The other cook was an interesting man. In addition to cooking dough nuts, he was a Pentecostal preacher and had a land clearing business, consisting of him, three illegals and chainsaws and axes. He sold firewood, too. He worked for Walmart because he and his wife needed insurance. One time four of his congregants came to his house and told him it was unseemly, their preacher cooking dough nuts at Walmart. He said he would gladly quit if the congregation would pay him a full time preacher's salary and insurance. Those people found another congregation to attend.
DeleteHow about cornmeal, catfish fillets, more catfish fillets 'til it's all clean, then have a special on ready-to-cook fish? Seasoning optional.
DeleteSgtBob, those are the type of congregants that would have thought it was 'unseemly' for Jesus to be a carpenter, too. :rolleyes:
DeleteScott: I never thought of that. Being the son and grand son of a mechanic, though, I never looked down on anybody's hand work.
DeletePretty hoity-toity for Pentecostals.
DeleteI wonder if the absorbent my work (Home Depot) uses for spills would work here.
ReplyDeleteAnother interesting tip, Simple Green does beautifully at getting the remains of fresh spilled paint off of concrete floors. Use an absorbent to soak up the bulk of the paint, and then saturate the spot with Simple Green and wipe up.
When I cleaned car lift train bays at Nick's Sunoco, I would first sweep area, then apply gasoline directly to the oil stain, gently sweep this in, followed by an absorbent like cat litter or saw dust works. Try it on your garage stains, but leave doors open.
ReplyDeleteGood advice for fun if you have a gas water heater!
DeleteRemember, liquid burns - vapors explode.
Boric acid works great at cleaning oil stains on concrete and is not FLAMMABLE!!!grayman
DeleteCornmeal. I would have never thought of that. My mother makes window cleaner out of water and corn starch that gets the windows spotless. At least she used to. These days at 85 she mostly plays cards with her friends and sips an occasional glass of chardonnay. After being abandoned by my Dad with 5 kids and raising all us I guess she can do whatever she wants. I think the windows in her apartment might be dirty.
ReplyDeleteThere is a Popeye joke in here, but it would be completely not safe for work.
ReplyDelete