How Do You Get Deodorant Stains Out of Your Undershirts? Part Two.
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Deo-Go cleans set-in yellow underarm stains, deodorant build-up, and odor.
Update 9/2012
Be sure to browse through all the comments in this article below for what works and what doesn’t.
Also, check out New Pit Stain Problem You Tube Channel.
Update 7/2010
| Deo-Go is 100% Effective in Removing Yellow Armpit Stains and Deodorant Build-up from Shirts.
Check out my Deo-Go Review Here. |
– original article –
I’ve been getting lots of visitors interested in the topic of underarm stains. More specifically, how to remove them from your shirts.
A little over a week ago, I posted this article providing some information on the topic. After doing some additional research, I found these suggestions on Yahoo! Answers (but formated them nicely here for you to easily read). I have not tried these
Do you have yellow pit stains?
personally, but would love to hear from anyone who has. In the coming weeks I’ll test some of these out and report back.
- Ammonia/Water: Dilute a half cup of ammonia with 4 cups of water and daubing the solution on the stain repeatedly until it is lightened or removed entirely.
- Take two aspirins: Crush them and mix with a half cup of hot water. Pour directly on the stain and allow it to sit for a couple of hours.
- Baking soda: Add enough water to 1/4 cup of baking soda to form a runny paste. Apply directly to the stain and work it in. If the stain is particularly bad and smelly, let the baking soda paste remain on the garment for a couple of hours then brush it off. Baking soda is very good for removing odors!
- Fresh or concentrated lemon juice: You may squeeze fresh lemon juice directly on the stain until it is quite wet, then add a spoonful of table salt. Rub between your fingers until the stain lifts. This also helps remove dark underarm stains on t-shirts and undershirts. If it is a bright sunny day, exposing the garment to the sun and allowing it to dry will enhance the stain removing power of the lemon juice.
- Meat tenderizer: Another one for Ripley’s Believe It Or Not! Moisten the perspiration stain with warm water then sprinkle liberally with meat tenderizer. Work it is and allow it to sit for several minutes, then launder as usual.
- Salt: Regular table or pickling salt is a miraculous ingredient in many things, including household cleaners. Use salted water to soak stained garments; mix with white vinegar for a very good stain remover. Use with lemon juice – see #4 tip above.
- White vinegar: Mix a cup of white vinegar with 4 cups warm water. Dip stained garment in vinegar solution and scrub between your knuckles. If the stain is persistent, you may soak the entire garment in the vinegar solution for a couple of hours before running through a normal wash cycle. Check the fabric label to be sure it does not need to be dry cleaned!
- Oxi-Clean: This is a wonderful product for eliminating many clothing stains. Follow manufacturers directions.
- Borax: This is an old-time cleaning remedy that is still appropriate today – plus its a whole lot cheaper than some of the costly products on the supermarket shelves. Run warm water through the stain then sprinkle on a generous amount of Borax – don’t go crazy, but use enough so that you can see it like a good shake of salt on the stain. Rub it together with your fingers and then launder as usual.
Update – 8/26/08: Some more votes from a thread on Style Forum for rinsing with cold water & oxi-clean:
…The trick here is preemptive action, I believe. I used to get those stains too. Now I am careful to remove any excess antiperspirant from my armpits before I put on my shirts. When I take the shirts off I thoroughly rinse the underarms with cold water (I found a site online that had tested different methods and this was the best they found) and scrub them with a SprayNWash stick. In the wash, I use oxi clean. I don’t put my shirts in the dryer and I don’t run the iron over the underarm areas either – don’t want heat to set-in any remaining antiperspirant and make that evil permanent stain you are lamenting right now…
…Oxi Clean worked wonderfully on a number of my shirts underarm regions. A few of the more thoroughly-stained white shirts (with yummy yellow pits) were too far gone for Oxi Clean to work…
Update – 9/29/08: Found another possible remedy on this AskAndy forum thread.
It is my theory that sweat contains minerals, just like most tap water. When sweat, or tap water, evaporates, it leaves the mineral deposits behind. This is why bleach doesn’t remove it, because it isn’t a stain. If you hold one of your stained shirts up to the light, you will see that it looks like a deposit of material there.
I use products like CLR (calcium,lime,rust remover) with good success. I prefer the Zep brand stuff sold at Home Depot.
Update – 6/06/2009: Secret to Keeping Your Undershirts Their Whitest and Brightest without using Bleach
Update – 01/15/2010: A friend of my purchased The Encyclopedia of Men’s Clothing (says it’s amazing) from AskAndyAboutClothes.com and his book has a section about removing stains, perspiration and prevention. Here’s what it says:
YELLOW STAINS
Use denture cleaning tablets! Fill a basin with water and add one or two tablets. Let the tablets dissolve and then soak the garment until the yellow is gone.PERSPIRATION
Perspiration, if allowed to stay in fabric, will eventually permanently stain and weaken the fabric. Aluminum chlorides in antiperspirants can also stain and weaken fabric. Controlled use of antiperspirants and laundering shirts immediately after wear can minimize the damage.1. If the stains are fresh, soak the shirt in ammonia for 30 minutes then wash.
2. If they are older stains, try soaking in vinegar first. If that doesn’t do it, try heated white vinegar and borax or non-chlorine bleach. Old stains are more difficult to treat because they have been set, particularly from being heated in the dryer.You can also soak the shirt in a 50-50 mix of hydrogen peroxide and water for 30 minutes, then wash. And you can put liquid laundry detergent right on the stain, leave it for five to ten minutes, then wash.
Launder shirts in the hottest water safe for the fabric, using an enzyme detergent or a detergent with bleach alternative (check care labels to be sure this is okay).
Bleach and/or baking soda may set yellow perspiration/deodorant stains on the underarms of shirts.
PREVENTION:
Let deodorant dry before you put on your shirt. See the Deodorant or Antiperspirant in the Grooming Chapter, under Skin Care.
And don’t let stains sit! Apply pre-wash spray or liquid detergent ASAP, and then launder. Use the hottest water safe for the garment.
Wearing an undershirt can also help keep stains off your shirts. Wear a T-shirt or V-neck, any undershirt that covers the underarms, not a tank top. They’re comfortable and present a better appearance under a sheer dress shirt.
Category: Ask Tug, Sweat Management
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Sites That Link to this Post
- Ask Tug: Wanna Know the Secret to Keeping Your Undershirts Their Whitest and Brightest Without Using Bleach? | The Undershirt Guy Blog | June 5, 2009
- Ask Tug: Where can I find a comfortable Undershirt that keeps out the sweat stains? | The Undershirt Guy Blog | January 15, 2009
- Axe Gel Deodorant ruining-staining undershirts? | The Undershirt Guy Blog | July 29, 2008
Use only natural and aluminium free deodrants. It is not harmful for you and your health
heya pk, so if you did that, how would you prevent underarm sweating? that’s the purpose of using an antiperspirant over a deodorant isn’t it??
deodorants don’t provide any sweat protection, but do offer odor-control.
antiperspirants offer sweat protection, and most of (or all of) them also offer odor-control as well.
I have been researching this topic since my college aged son came home and I saw the stains in his favorite shirts. there was yellow stains and a hard residue buildup. some shirts actually glistened with small flecks of silver glitter. he said that was from a green can of spray Brut. he stopped using that a while ago.
I first applied shout and also had some Tide per treat spray. Nothing much happened. I washed the shirts between every successive product, but did not use the dryer. I tried the sprays again, soaking over night. no change. I even tried Lestoil, which is a solvent I use to remove tar. No change. I tried Citri-Solve another natural orange solvent. It actually left an orange cast.
I finally soaked overnight in a strong solution, per instructions , of Oxi-Clean and soaked over night, rubbing into the stains before washing. the change was remarkable. the stiff buildup was gone. the orange color from the Citri solve was gone and the original yellow stain was almost completely gone. this was a buildup over 2years. Oxi-Clean also has a spray that would be convenient for my son to apply to the shirts before they are thrown into the basket.
Now I have a question about deodorant that no one has mentioned. men have hair in their armpits. doesn’t the solid deodorants or antiperspirants just lay on the hair and not get to the skin? and I am guessing if you give it a good rubbing that perhaps there is alot of product there, maybe too much? do me ever shave? hair definitely collects bacteria and odor. I guess that’s why I have read that tea tree products work. the other question is, has Consumer Reports ever covered this topic? they have teams of scientists who investigate such things. And personal care is big business. maybe we all need to write to them!
hey kevan! thanks for stopping by and sharing your experiences trying to remove set-in/hardened yellow underarm stains from your son’s shirts!
from everything i’ve read, come across, or even tried myself, there are basically three products that are reasonably reliable in removing yellow/dark deodorant stains or build-up from shirts. they are oxi-clean, deo-go, and raise.
from the reports i’ve read, people are more successful with oxi-clean when they soak the garment overnight – like you did. with deo-go and raise, the process is a little faster since you only need to leave the solution on the underarm area for 30-60 minutes, but sometimes you have to treat the stain a couple times to get the stain fully out. in some instances, the stains just don’t come out either. i’m sure it has to do with how long stains have been on the garment, how severe they are, and other things like body chemistry, antiperspirant exposure, etc.
here’s a deo-go video review and demonstration that recently went up on the modernwife youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCtJw90c6Rs&feature=youtu.be
to your question about underarm hair:
from my own personal experience, most antiperspirants i’ve used seem to make their way through underarm hair during the application process. the underarm hair gets wet/saturated, and i’m sure a good amount penetrates the skin enough to become effective in doing it’s job of blocking sweat through a chemical reaction that causes the sweat glands [eccrine-gland ducts] to swell and close.
shaving underarm hair: this is a great question. over the last 5+ year, i’ve been seeing a lot more public display proof of men shaving their underarms. heck, mrs. tug and i were recently watching and episode of big brother where britney and danielle used a nair-like product to remove ian’s underarm hair. some guys go with completely removing the underarm hair (nair, shave, wax), and others like me do trimming to keep the hair short, without fully removing it all. for me, i just feel cleaner and more hygienic when my body hair is trimmed, but i’m sure it also reduces odor and bacteria too.
tea tree products: i’ve definitely read about odor eliminating / reducing products like tea tree, but if i recall correctly none of them actually are effective as an antiperspirant. i find there is a lot of confusion with the term “deodorant”. some people use the term when talking about sweat-blocking characteristics (which is antiperspirant) and while some antiperspirants are also deodorants (anti-odor), a deodorant alone is not an antiperspirant.
bear in mind, there are ways to minimize underarm shirt staining. one, is to let your antiperspirant fully dry before putting on your clothes – this is what i do. there are also some antiperspirants that are less likely to result in underarm staining or build-up. off the top of my head there are products like stainguard and nivea invisible, but there are others.
here are a couple of good threads on askandyaboutclothes.com that talk about underarm stains, removal, prevention:
http://www.askandyaboutclothes.com/forum/showthread.php?112040-Ugh-Yellow-Underarm-Stains
http://www.askandyaboutclothes.com/forum/showthread.php?116562-OCBD-s-in-the-heat/page2
there are tons more sites out there that talk about these issues, but if you go to a site like askandy or style forum, you’ll get first-hand knowledge from community members talking about what worked and didn’t work for them.
thanks for stopping by! let me know if you have any other questions (: