mothballs and cedar

Re: mothballs and cedar

Simon Watson (U.K.)

>[I'd dead against mothballs and know they can damage the environment, and they smell unpleasant].

It may be so thoroughly impregnated into the wood that the mothball smell may take time to clear - although it probably would eventually if you just left it alone, open and exposed to the air. My solution would be to use that other great moth deterrant, lavender, and spray some essence of that lightly on the inside. Hopefully, this would overwhelm the mothball smell. You could also try try sanding the cedar lightly as this is the traditional way of reviving it as a moth deterrant. And/or you could put on a light coating of turpentine, which smells very simillar to cedar (it comes from pitch pine, maybe cedar too). One or a mixture of these may get rid of the dreaded m/b smell. My parents love them m/bs and so do their elderly relatives. Everytime one of them dies we end up packed in a small Baptist church for the funeral the smell of it in their clothing is powerful. Maybe it is meant to ward off the Devil as well as moths!

Simon

A different perspective

Bill Tindall, E. TN

>I associate the smell of moth balls with getting out the wool winter wear in the frozen north and that meant ice fishing, rabbit and deer hunting, sledding and other good things (snow shoveling was still an adult activity). Cedar chests are supposed to smell like moth balls.

never-the-less, the materials used for moth balls are quite volatile and airing it out will eventually get rid of the smell just as airing out the wool did/does. Warmer will work faster than colder.

Re: mothballs and cedar *LINK*

Russ Allen- Chicago

>Paul,

I had the same problem. I found that lightly sanding the inside followed by a heathy dose of cedar oil took care of the problem. The oil is expensive (8oz $15) but it was the only thing that worked for me. The oil also works to recharge an old chest that has lost its smell.

Russ Allen- Chicago


cedar oil

Re: mothballs and cedar

Paul Brandley

>I found some information at this address that may help. Also, I think that they sell lava rock for this purpose. It comes in different size porous plastic bags. I've seen it in stores near cleaning products and I think I've seen it in WW catalogs.

http://www.brettunsvillage.com/trunks/howto/odors.html

Lavender?!

Scott in Douglassville, PA

>I didn't know lavender repelled moths. Good to know - I hate (wait a minute - hate) the smell of cedar. We grow a ton of lavender - might have to start shoving cuttings into chests...

Re: mothballs and cedar

Alan Hamilton

>Paul,

ALERT: this is second-hand information; I've never tried this.

An acquaintence told me that he aired out his blanket chest with moth-ball smell. He put it out on his driveway and oriented the chest so the sun shined in directly on the wood so far as possible. Then he dumped in some baking soda (NOT powder) and swished it around so it touched all the wood. He left the soda alone for a couple days, with the chest open, vacuumed out the soda, and voila': no more moth-ball smell.

Again, I'm just reporting what I was told. I make no guarantees.

Alan

Re: A different perspective

Paul Barnard

>As my friend lives in the great white north she certainly doesn't want reminding of it. We are having a vertiable heat wave this week we are almost up to 0 F :-)

Thanks

Paul Barnard

>A usefull set of options. I will go for the airing / baking soad / volcanic approach first and if that fails get out the sand paper and cedar oil.

Dang never had to take sandpaper to a peice of furniture before ;-)