Nobody likes mold in the house, but whether we like it or not, mold will get into your home. It comes in the house attached to the bottoms of our shoes, attached to our clothing, and through the doors, windows, and the air conditioning unit. The only thing that you have control over is whether the conditions in your home are favorable for the mold to begin growing.
Something that mold loves to hide underneath is your carpet. If the carpet is old (especially if you have it in the bathroom), you can bet there is likely to be something living underneath it. Not only does mold like to hide under your carpet, it will also make a meal out of it. In order to reproduce, mold requires moisture, warmth, and food. The carpet provides part of the insulation that the mold needs to grow under it, so all that is left for you to provide is moisture either in the form of humidity or water spills that do not get cleaned up properly.
If you think that your carpet is moldy or mildewed, you can clean it with a biocide. Biocides are produced to stop things like mold and bacteria from growing where you do not want them to. Even if you use this, though, you will still have to remove the carpet padding underneath. This padding is not cleanable and will need to be thrown away. If your carpet has been completely submerged in water and it is not just a small area, it is advised to just tear it up and throw it away, as well. Cleaning a room’s entire carpet can be costly and it’s possible that you are better off just getting new carpet.
While you are cleaning your moldy carpet, you should wear gloves. After it has completely dried, using a vacuum that has a HEPA filter on it should remove any mold spores that still remain in the fibers of the carpet.
Having wall-to-wall carpeting is not advised. If you already have it, you can reduce the chances of mold and mildew growing by removing your shoes before walking on it and disallowing pets to enter carpeted areas. Using a good vacuum cleaner (with a HEPA filter) regularly will also help to stop mold from growing. HEPA filters are about 99.97 percent accurate in removing particles from your carpet and air.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
water damage restoration companies and
Dallas Residential Water Damage Restoration Contractors.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Home Water Damage Causes
Despite the general knowledge that water damage is bad for any building, especially one’s home, it is not so well known just what all the possible causes for water damage are, or what factors can lead to it. The most common known causes of water damage are leaky plumbing, and leaking roofs, but there are mounds of other causes that are not as well known.
If you have a basement, and you have it insulated with fiberglass, it is easy for moisture to become trapped behind the walls, and air between one floor of the home and the basement floor can leak into them. It is because of this that insulating your home with fiberglass is not recommended, nor is installing plastic sheeting, as it is capable of trapping just as much moisture. A good idea for the insulation is using blue board, as it allows the moisture to move about the wall freely and makes the wall better able to dry off.
Problems, however, can arise if the land your home is on is sloped towards its foundation. If water is flowing towards the home, as opposed to away the home, it can seep into the basement and cause serious damage to the structure of your home, and can cause sink holes, which can cause your house to sink.
You should especially be careful to have your ceilings properly insulated in a cold climate, on account of the fact that they are not, water can leak into your house by way of what are called “ice dams”. In a warmer climate, flaws in air conditioning or air ducts can cause water damage by the formation of steam and humidity that likes to attach itself to things like roofing. And this build up can cause rotting on your roof as well as the infestation of mold, which can be harmful on one’s respiratory system as well as many other sicknesses that may result.
Improperly shielded attic hatches are another chief offender of water damage to one’s ceilings, as condensation is far more likely to gather in this manner. Lighting fixtures should be as tight as humanly possible when you install them, especially the recessed kind and exhaust fans are not directed outside from the house, it should be, whether they are in the bathroom, or places of this nature. Exhaust fans should have vents to the outside so moisture does not condense and cause avoidable water damage.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
South Carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
Connecticut water damage restoration companies across the united states.
If you have a basement, and you have it insulated with fiberglass, it is easy for moisture to become trapped behind the walls, and air between one floor of the home and the basement floor can leak into them. It is because of this that insulating your home with fiberglass is not recommended, nor is installing plastic sheeting, as it is capable of trapping just as much moisture. A good idea for the insulation is using blue board, as it allows the moisture to move about the wall freely and makes the wall better able to dry off.
Problems, however, can arise if the land your home is on is sloped towards its foundation. If water is flowing towards the home, as opposed to away the home, it can seep into the basement and cause serious damage to the structure of your home, and can cause sink holes, which can cause your house to sink.
You should especially be careful to have your ceilings properly insulated in a cold climate, on account of the fact that they are not, water can leak into your house by way of what are called “ice dams”. In a warmer climate, flaws in air conditioning or air ducts can cause water damage by the formation of steam and humidity that likes to attach itself to things like roofing. And this build up can cause rotting on your roof as well as the infestation of mold, which can be harmful on one’s respiratory system as well as many other sicknesses that may result.
Improperly shielded attic hatches are another chief offender of water damage to one’s ceilings, as condensation is far more likely to gather in this manner. Lighting fixtures should be as tight as humanly possible when you install them, especially the recessed kind and exhaust fans are not directed outside from the house, it should be, whether they are in the bathroom, or places of this nature. Exhaust fans should have vents to the outside so moisture does not condense and cause avoidable water damage.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
South Carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
Connecticut water damage restoration companies across the united states.
Different Kinds of Mold
Mold has been a problem for human beings ever since even Biblical times. There are thousands of species of it and while many are harmless, some of them can be pretty detrimental to your and your pet’s health. They can grow on wet clothes left laying anywhere on the floor or stuffed animals in the closet. Anywhere that has a high amount of humidity and heat is a place where mold can begin to grow. Mold has become more of a problem in the past few years not really because the population of mold in the world has increased, but because people have become aware that this is a problem that they need to try and deal with. There are about three general categories of mold and you should be familiar with what each of them are.
Pathogenic molds can cause health issues in people who have weakened immune systems like those who are going through chemotherapy due to cancer or anyone who has HIV or AIDs. Infants and the elderly are also particularly at risk. If you have this kind of mold living in your home, it’s best to call a professional mold remediation company and have them remove it. If you try to remove this yourself, you may just stir it up and cross-contaminate another area of your home.
Allergenic molds affect many people and these, as their classification may indicate, tend to cause allergies in people and sometimes in pets. Anyone who has a problem with asthma or anyone with a weak immune system might have some trouble if these live in the same place they do.
Toxic molds produce mycotoxins and while they tend to be rare, they can cause many serious kinds of health effects and can even cause death in some extreme circumstances. You should contact a professional as soon as possible once you have determined (via a mold test kit) that the mold is toxic.
Stachybotrys mold is more commonly thought of as the “toxic black mold” of legend. This tends to be found on wet materials that are cellulose based, such as paper or wood. One strain of stachybotrys mold can cause death in pets and another type can cause bleeding in the lungs in babies. It is commonly a hidden mold growth and cannot be detected by the naked eye, as it likes to grow under ceilings and behind walls and can go unnoticed for a long time.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
north carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
New Jersey mold remediation companies across the united states.
Pathogenic molds can cause health issues in people who have weakened immune systems like those who are going through chemotherapy due to cancer or anyone who has HIV or AIDs. Infants and the elderly are also particularly at risk. If you have this kind of mold living in your home, it’s best to call a professional mold remediation company and have them remove it. If you try to remove this yourself, you may just stir it up and cross-contaminate another area of your home.
Allergenic molds affect many people and these, as their classification may indicate, tend to cause allergies in people and sometimes in pets. Anyone who has a problem with asthma or anyone with a weak immune system might have some trouble if these live in the same place they do.
Toxic molds produce mycotoxins and while they tend to be rare, they can cause many serious kinds of health effects and can even cause death in some extreme circumstances. You should contact a professional as soon as possible once you have determined (via a mold test kit) that the mold is toxic.
Stachybotrys mold is more commonly thought of as the “toxic black mold” of legend. This tends to be found on wet materials that are cellulose based, such as paper or wood. One strain of stachybotrys mold can cause death in pets and another type can cause bleeding in the lungs in babies. It is commonly a hidden mold growth and cannot be detected by the naked eye, as it likes to grow under ceilings and behind walls and can go unnoticed for a long time.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
north carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
New Jersey mold remediation companies across the united states.
A Short History of Penicillin
Since the early 1900’s, we have been using a drug called Penicillin to treat bacterial infections in the human body, but something a lot of people don’t know is that it was discovered quite by accident by a Scottish scientist named Sir Alexander Fleming in the year 1928.
In his laboratory in St. Mary’s Hospital in London, he discovered that the mold Penicillium notatum had found its way into a culture dish of Staphylococcus and was inhibiting its growth. He thought initially that it could be a good disinfectant and noted that it was highly effective, but was minimally toxic. The importance of his discovery was not really known at the time and the use of penicillin did not really begin until the 1940’s. Howard Florey and three of his colleagues at Oxford University started to research further into penicillin. The ability that it had to kill infectious bacteria was particularly interesting, but since the country was in the middle of World War II, it was unable to gather the funds necessary to produce mass amounts of the penicillin required for clinical trials and looked to the United States for assistance.
A search worldwide began for the perfect strain of penicillin mold that would produce the largest amount of the mold when it was grown in a vat containing corn steep liquor and strangely, it was not found abroad, but right at home in Peoria in a market next to the lab assisting Oxford with the production of the mold.
By almost the end of 1941, Andrew J. Moyer, a mold nutrition expert, succeeded in multiplying the penicillin production by 10 times and by the year 1943, the clinical trials needed to approve the penicillin doses for public use. These doses were extremely expensive in the year 1940, but as time went on, they became much less costly, being around $20 a dose in July of 1943, and around fifty cents per dose in 1946.
About four years after penicillin had begun being produced on a large scale in 1943, bacteria and other microbes started resisting it. Staphylococcus aureus was one of the first to effectively battle penicillin and while it is a normal, mostly harmless inhabitant of the human body, it can cause pneumonia or TSS (toxic shock syndrome, associated with the use of tampons) when it begins to multiply in large numbers. It then begins to produce a toxin and this is what makes the person ill.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Connecticut Mold Remediation services and other states such as
north carolina mold remediation companies across the united states.
In his laboratory in St. Mary’s Hospital in London, he discovered that the mold Penicillium notatum had found its way into a culture dish of Staphylococcus and was inhibiting its growth. He thought initially that it could be a good disinfectant and noted that it was highly effective, but was minimally toxic. The importance of his discovery was not really known at the time and the use of penicillin did not really begin until the 1940’s. Howard Florey and three of his colleagues at Oxford University started to research further into penicillin. The ability that it had to kill infectious bacteria was particularly interesting, but since the country was in the middle of World War II, it was unable to gather the funds necessary to produce mass amounts of the penicillin required for clinical trials and looked to the United States for assistance.
A search worldwide began for the perfect strain of penicillin mold that would produce the largest amount of the mold when it was grown in a vat containing corn steep liquor and strangely, it was not found abroad, but right at home in Peoria in a market next to the lab assisting Oxford with the production of the mold.
By almost the end of 1941, Andrew J. Moyer, a mold nutrition expert, succeeded in multiplying the penicillin production by 10 times and by the year 1943, the clinical trials needed to approve the penicillin doses for public use. These doses were extremely expensive in the year 1940, but as time went on, they became much less costly, being around $20 a dose in July of 1943, and around fifty cents per dose in 1946.
About four years after penicillin had begun being produced on a large scale in 1943, bacteria and other microbes started resisting it. Staphylococcus aureus was one of the first to effectively battle penicillin and while it is a normal, mostly harmless inhabitant of the human body, it can cause pneumonia or TSS (toxic shock syndrome, associated with the use of tampons) when it begins to multiply in large numbers. It then begins to produce a toxin and this is what makes the person ill.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Connecticut Mold Remediation services and other states such as
north carolina mold remediation companies across the united states.
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Mold and Food: What to Throw Away
Food in our refrigerators becoming contaminated with mold is just a simple fact of life. It is fairly inevitable, no matter how clean you try to keep your refrigerator, but which foods do you throw away?
It grows on everything that we eat and a few things that we do not, but when we find it in our refrigerators, we often end up arguing with ourselves over whether or not it will still be safe to eat if we remove the molded portions. The fact is that most foods, when they become contaminated with mold, cannot be saved. It can be a jar of our favorite jam or the sour cream you love to put on top of tacos, but if it gets mold on it, you might as well just toss it. Go buy another container and save yourself the trouble of a doctor visit later.
The reason that you need to throw most items away is that foods that have a high amount of moisture in them such as sour cream, cottage cheese, jellies, and jams, will become contaminated all the way through them because they are soft foods. The mold can easily get to the rest of the container, unlike in more dense items like blocks of cheese or in dense meats like hard salami. If mold gets onto these more dense items, you can generally cut out the moldy parts and just throw them away. As long as you cut one inch around and underneath the molded part of the food and throw it in the garbage, the rest of the item should be fine to eat.
When you bring home fruits and vegetables, make sure that they are clean and have no bad spots on them. If they do, make sure and cut them off before storing them in your refrigerator. Some fruits and vegetables will be fine when stored in plastic, but the use of re-sealable plastic bags is recommended over simple plastic wrap. Throw away any fruit or vegetables that have become contaminated, since this will cause other items nearby to become contaminated, as well.
Anything that has been baked such as cakes or breads should be thrown away if you find mold growing on them. These foods are porous and the mold is likely to have contaminated the majority of it.
Lunch meats should also be thrown away if they are found to be contaminated. These have a high moisture content and cannot be saved.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
water damage restoration contractors and
Mold Remediation companies across the united states. (1)
It grows on everything that we eat and a few things that we do not, but when we find it in our refrigerators, we often end up arguing with ourselves over whether or not it will still be safe to eat if we remove the molded portions. The fact is that most foods, when they become contaminated with mold, cannot be saved. It can be a jar of our favorite jam or the sour cream you love to put on top of tacos, but if it gets mold on it, you might as well just toss it. Go buy another container and save yourself the trouble of a doctor visit later.
The reason that you need to throw most items away is that foods that have a high amount of moisture in them such as sour cream, cottage cheese, jellies, and jams, will become contaminated all the way through them because they are soft foods. The mold can easily get to the rest of the container, unlike in more dense items like blocks of cheese or in dense meats like hard salami. If mold gets onto these more dense items, you can generally cut out the moldy parts and just throw them away. As long as you cut one inch around and underneath the molded part of the food and throw it in the garbage, the rest of the item should be fine to eat.
When you bring home fruits and vegetables, make sure that they are clean and have no bad spots on them. If they do, make sure and cut them off before storing them in your refrigerator. Some fruits and vegetables will be fine when stored in plastic, but the use of re-sealable plastic bags is recommended over simple plastic wrap. Throw away any fruit or vegetables that have become contaminated, since this will cause other items nearby to become contaminated, as well.
Anything that has been baked such as cakes or breads should be thrown away if you find mold growing on them. These foods are porous and the mold is likely to have contaminated the majority of it.
Lunch meats should also be thrown away if they are found to be contaminated. These have a high moisture content and cannot be saved.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
water damage restoration contractors and
Mold Remediation companies across the united states. (1)
Household Water Damage Prevention Tips
Water damage is something that no homeowner wants to have to deal with, but many times it is just a fact of life. Whether it is a flood, excessive rain, or even something as devastating as a hurricane, sometimes water damage cannot be helped, but what about the water damage that occurs to our homes that are simply accidents? Or something that we have just overlooked for far too long? There are quite a few things that you can to in order to keep water damage from impacting your pocketbook, but for them to have any affect, you have to remain vigilant.
Cleaning out your rain gutters as soon as the leaves stop falling in autumn is a pretty good idea. What your rain gutters do is keep the rain that falls on your roof from simply falling to the base of your home and settling there. Allowing water to settle around the base of your home will eventually cause it to sink into the ground, doing damage not only to the structure of the house, but also to the home’s value, as well. Another way to prevent this kind of slowly occurring damage is to make sure that the soil around the foundation of your home is piled up against the house at an angle so water drains away from the foundation naturally. Keep downspouts clear of leaves and sticks, as well, and make sure that the bottom of the downspout has gully that drains the water coming out of it away from the home.
Making sure the plumbing that leads to your dishwasher or to your clothes washer is of good condition. You should not have to replace these hoses very often, maybe around every 4 to 5 years, but hoses of poor quality can rupture and leave you with a huge mess, especially if you happen to be out of the home at the time it bursts. Clean up any spills as quickly as possible, but if the floor in your kitchen is hardwood, the best thing to do is just soak up whatever water you can with towels. If you have a vacuum used to draw water up, such as a carpet shampooer, you can use this to get some more of the water out. Do not use artificial heat to dry your floor, because this can cause the floor to buckle or cause what is called “cupping”.
Something else that you can do is install a vent in your bathroom and kitchen. This allows the steam that builds up from cooking or bathing to escape the house and not be absorbed by your walls and ceiling.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
water damage restoration companies and
Dallas Residential Water Damage Restoration Contractors.
Cleaning out your rain gutters as soon as the leaves stop falling in autumn is a pretty good idea. What your rain gutters do is keep the rain that falls on your roof from simply falling to the base of your home and settling there. Allowing water to settle around the base of your home will eventually cause it to sink into the ground, doing damage not only to the structure of the house, but also to the home’s value, as well. Another way to prevent this kind of slowly occurring damage is to make sure that the soil around the foundation of your home is piled up against the house at an angle so water drains away from the foundation naturally. Keep downspouts clear of leaves and sticks, as well, and make sure that the bottom of the downspout has gully that drains the water coming out of it away from the home.
Making sure the plumbing that leads to your dishwasher or to your clothes washer is of good condition. You should not have to replace these hoses very often, maybe around every 4 to 5 years, but hoses of poor quality can rupture and leave you with a huge mess, especially if you happen to be out of the home at the time it bursts. Clean up any spills as quickly as possible, but if the floor in your kitchen is hardwood, the best thing to do is just soak up whatever water you can with towels. If you have a vacuum used to draw water up, such as a carpet shampooer, you can use this to get some more of the water out. Do not use artificial heat to dry your floor, because this can cause the floor to buckle or cause what is called “cupping”.
Something else that you can do is install a vent in your bathroom and kitchen. This allows the steam that builds up from cooking or bathing to escape the house and not be absorbed by your walls and ceiling.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
water damage restoration companies and
Dallas Residential Water Damage Restoration Contractors.
Dealing With Landlords and Insurance Companies About Mold
Whether you rent an apartment or own your own home, mold can be a huge problem to have to deal with. Insurance claims adjusters will usually deny your claim simply because the vast majority of homeowner’s insurance policies simply do not cover the cost to remove mold from the home. Landlords presented with a mold problem in one of their units or in the home that they are renting out are sometimes quick to blame the problem on the tenant rather than admit that the problem is structural or was there before the tenant moved in.
There are a few insurance adjusters that will try to trick you into saying that mold has been around for millennia and that it is not the health threat that people are saying that it is or that the mold contamination in the home is somehow your own fault. If the infestation is obviously not your fault, do not say anything that suggests that it might be. If he/she claims that mold is not a problem like people say, point at the Bible. The scriptures in Leviticus 14:39-49 clearly tell how dangerous mold was considered to be in the time of ancient Judaism and tell how the homes were considered to be “diseased” or “plagued” by mold. It also tells just how these contaminated homes and belongings were dealt with. The rabbi inspected these buildings and determined what was to happen to them and the basic procedure was to remove all belongings from the home and take them far away from the village and people, to shut up the house for a week, and to examine the home again. If it was still not free of contamination, it was torn down and a new one built.
Landlords should be told the same thing if they tell you that mold is not a health threat. You need to provide the landlord proof that there is a problem via mold testing. The burden of proof is on you, not them. Test the home yourself and send a copy of the test results to the landlord via certified mail. If he/she does not respond, send another letter saying you are withholding your rent until the problem is fixed. Lastly, if that was ignored, send yet another letter via certified mail stating that you are re-locating and seeking legal action.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
South Carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
Connecticut water damage restoration companies across the united states.
There are a few insurance adjusters that will try to trick you into saying that mold has been around for millennia and that it is not the health threat that people are saying that it is or that the mold contamination in the home is somehow your own fault. If the infestation is obviously not your fault, do not say anything that suggests that it might be. If he/she claims that mold is not a problem like people say, point at the Bible. The scriptures in Leviticus 14:39-49 clearly tell how dangerous mold was considered to be in the time of ancient Judaism and tell how the homes were considered to be “diseased” or “plagued” by mold. It also tells just how these contaminated homes and belongings were dealt with. The rabbi inspected these buildings and determined what was to happen to them and the basic procedure was to remove all belongings from the home and take them far away from the village and people, to shut up the house for a week, and to examine the home again. If it was still not free of contamination, it was torn down and a new one built.
Landlords should be told the same thing if they tell you that mold is not a health threat. You need to provide the landlord proof that there is a problem via mold testing. The burden of proof is on you, not them. Test the home yourself and send a copy of the test results to the landlord via certified mail. If he/she does not respond, send another letter saying you are withholding your rent until the problem is fixed. Lastly, if that was ignored, send yet another letter via certified mail stating that you are re-locating and seeking legal action.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
South Carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
Connecticut water damage restoration companies across the united states.
Your Cell Phone, Water, and a Sticker
Water is a part of our everyday lives, but most of us who own electronic devices can readily admit that it is not only the source of live, but also the source of some pretty pricey problems. It is every cell phone or blackberry owner’s nightmare: dropping that $400 device into the bathtub or into the pool. What do you do with it after you drop it into water? How late is too late to save it? And if it can be saved, how do you do it?
Well, if you have a newer cell phone, odds are that if you drop it in water, you will not be able to get the phone’s warranty to cover the water damage. It is not covered under most cell phone warranties and this is one reason that you should be especially careful if you plan on getting your phone anywhere near water. The new phones have been equipped with small white stickers both inside the battery compartments and on the circuit board deeper inside the phone. When the phone gets wet (or when it is simply exposed to humidity that is just too high), the sticker changes color due to a powdered dye underneath it. When you take your phone to the manufacturer to try and file a claim, they tell you that they cannot give you any compensation because the phone has been water damaged, even if you have not actually dropped the phone in water. If humidity is too high, the sticker trips and you are out of luck.
What can you do to try and remedy this problem? If you live in an area that is subject to pretty high humidity, you can take a piece of satin finished scotch tape and place a piece over the sticker on the battery compartment. The problem is getting to the other sticker that is usually on the phone’s circuit board. If you can manage that, then hat’s off to you. If your phone stops working and you need to file a claim, remove the tape.
If you do happen to drop your phone in the water, get it out in under 20 seconds and remove the power supply completely. Submerge it in a bowl of uncooked rice at least overnight and do NOT try to power on the phone until you are completely certain it is dry. If you put the battery back in and it works, congratulations. If not, try using it with your AC adapter. If this works, all you need is a new phone battery.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
north carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
New Jersey mold remediation companies across the united states.
Well, if you have a newer cell phone, odds are that if you drop it in water, you will not be able to get the phone’s warranty to cover the water damage. It is not covered under most cell phone warranties and this is one reason that you should be especially careful if you plan on getting your phone anywhere near water. The new phones have been equipped with small white stickers both inside the battery compartments and on the circuit board deeper inside the phone. When the phone gets wet (or when it is simply exposed to humidity that is just too high), the sticker changes color due to a powdered dye underneath it. When you take your phone to the manufacturer to try and file a claim, they tell you that they cannot give you any compensation because the phone has been water damaged, even if you have not actually dropped the phone in water. If humidity is too high, the sticker trips and you are out of luck.
What can you do to try and remedy this problem? If you live in an area that is subject to pretty high humidity, you can take a piece of satin finished scotch tape and place a piece over the sticker on the battery compartment. The problem is getting to the other sticker that is usually on the phone’s circuit board. If you can manage that, then hat’s off to you. If your phone stops working and you need to file a claim, remove the tape.
If you do happen to drop your phone in the water, get it out in under 20 seconds and remove the power supply completely. Submerge it in a bowl of uncooked rice at least overnight and do NOT try to power on the phone until you are completely certain it is dry. If you put the battery back in and it works, congratulations. If not, try using it with your AC adapter. If this works, all you need is a new phone battery.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
north carolina flood water damage restoration and other states such as
New Jersey mold remediation companies across the united states.
Testing Your Home For Mold
Testing for mold in your home is not really a complicated process, but if you should know that if you do not follow the instructions that come on the package to the letter, the test will be almost completely useless both to you and to the mold laboratory that you send the test kit samples to. Most test kits are fairly straight forward, but this is a rundown of what you are going to have to do, even if you do not use just the test kits.
Sometimes knowing where you need to test for mold contamination is pretty easily simply because of the fact that the mold is either completely visible on the walls, ceiling, or other belongings, but also due to the fact that many kinds of mold have a significant musty odor to them. You can take a sample of the mold that you can see on the walls by taking a knife (a clean one) and scraping some of it off into the test kit. Be careful here and do not inhale the mold spores. Wear rubber gloves and a respirator while doing this, if you can. Whether you are wearing gloves or not, though, you should wash your hands afterward before going to test another site and especially before you eat anything.
If you want to, you can also take a piece of scotch tape and lift some of the mold off the wall. Some people may prefer this over the knife method, but it is a matter of personal preference. The knife method is more likely to stir up the spores than the tape method.
Set a test kit out in every room of your home after you have run the air conditioner or fans in every room for about ten to fifteen minutes to get the spores stirred up. Tape at least one kit to the grill of an air conditioning vent so you will know if there is any mold growing inside the duct itself. If the air conditioner continues to blow mold spores out into the house after it has been run for about 15 minutes, you know you have a problem in your ventilation system.
After you collect the test kits from around your house, you need to label them all with your name, address, where each test kit was used in the home, and any other pertinent information. This should also include how long you left the test kit setting out in your home, whether it was 30 minutes or a day.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Connecticut Mold Remediation services and other states such as
north carolina mold remediation companies across the united states.
Sometimes knowing where you need to test for mold contamination is pretty easily simply because of the fact that the mold is either completely visible on the walls, ceiling, or other belongings, but also due to the fact that many kinds of mold have a significant musty odor to them. You can take a sample of the mold that you can see on the walls by taking a knife (a clean one) and scraping some of it off into the test kit. Be careful here and do not inhale the mold spores. Wear rubber gloves and a respirator while doing this, if you can. Whether you are wearing gloves or not, though, you should wash your hands afterward before going to test another site and especially before you eat anything.
If you want to, you can also take a piece of scotch tape and lift some of the mold off the wall. Some people may prefer this over the knife method, but it is a matter of personal preference. The knife method is more likely to stir up the spores than the tape method.
Set a test kit out in every room of your home after you have run the air conditioner or fans in every room for about ten to fifteen minutes to get the spores stirred up. Tape at least one kit to the grill of an air conditioning vent so you will know if there is any mold growing inside the duct itself. If the air conditioner continues to blow mold spores out into the house after it has been run for about 15 minutes, you know you have a problem in your ventilation system.
After you collect the test kits from around your house, you need to label them all with your name, address, where each test kit was used in the home, and any other pertinent information. This should also include how long you left the test kit setting out in your home, whether it was 30 minutes or a day.
Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of quality
Connecticut Mold Remediation services and other states such as
north carolina mold remediation companies across the united states.
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