that old plane smell

wheaties

wheaties

Pre-takeoff checklist
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wheaties
My 1964 plane has what I can only call a "old machine" smell. Reminds me of visiting an old Navy boat in NYC: steal, grease and oil. I don’t mind but my daughter comments every time; son pipes up too.

It eminates from the pedals, control cables, hoses, old paint and firewall. I've taken some grease remover to some things but it still lingers.

Anyone got any pointers?
 
Replace the carpet and any cloth upholstery
 
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Don't like the smell of my old plane ... don't ride in it! :)

Just kidding, of course you want the kids to come along. New upholstery and some Febreze might help it out.
 
My 1954 C 170B had that old airplane smell, I cleaned the carpet, seats, headliner etc, and then cleaned under the floor to get as much of the gunk out of the bottom, that took care of a lot of the old smell, then opened the doors and let it air out.
if I close it up I still can smell some of that smell,
 
You have to replace the carpet and cloth. You can't clean 30 years of baked in smells.
 
The carpet was redone less than 20 years ago. It's immaculate. I'm actually blown away with the quality of the job they did.

Guess this is better than "replace the hoses" or pull the panel to clean.
 
Once you get fuel and brake fluid, etc smells into the carpet, it doesn't much matter how it looks.

If the seats and side panels are cloth, it'll hold the smell also.
 
Joe_B1 said:
Thats one of the things that make old planes great! I wish they put that smell in a spray can!
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I couldn’t agree more. When my old 47 Cessna 140 comes out of annual and they always clean the inside of the windows with plexus… it smells abhorrent as it’s such a nice smell. The right smell comes back but I help speed it up by putting some greasy rags n such in a bucket and put em in the cabin…

I always give my shop crap for making my plane smell wierd :)

have em put a little vicks on just below their nose…
 
Huckster79 said:
I couldn’t agree more. When my old 47 Cessna 140 comes out of annual and they always clean the inside of the windows with plexus… it smells abhorrent as it’s such a nice smell. The right smell comes back but I help speed it up by putting some greasy rags n such in a bucket and put em in the cabin…

I always give my shop crap for making my plane smell wierd :)

have em put a little vicks on just below their nose…
Click to expand...
One of the reasons I like machine shops and old gas station garages. Something about gas and oil...
 
I seriously doubt it would help for those lube oil based odors. But some of it is probably old sweat and such that this definitely will help with

the best thing I've found to combat odors is chlorine dioxide. Companies make "bombs" for use in cars, boats, and such
It gets into the fabric, foam, crevices, and such and kills the sources of odor such as molds, and organic stuff. Kinda leaves a "clean, sterile" smell. A little like something cleaned with bleach but not strong like that.
This is the best of the two different times I've tried a bomb...but there are probably better ones out there. I tried another one by StarBrite, I think is the name...a boating products company. It was much smaller and didn't work even in side a car
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001U5AP8Q/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I have also used this stuff in a garden fogger.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010REMQ4Q/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Following the other suggestions, I would be inclined to wash carpet and anything you can get out and rinse with the Vitaloxide stuff.... or instead a pretty good pet deodorizer is Natures Miracle. That one might at least help to mask some of it even if it doesn't eliminate it.

Would need to think harder about how it might affect avionics. It's not corrosive for limited use but I'd research that end a little more carefully for use in the plane itself but I'm fairly certain that potential risk could be minimized.
 
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all dis cleanin, perfect way to ensure your pax this weekend will be the weak-stomach variety.
 
Ozone generators are used to get odors out of houses. Pet poop and pee. Smoke. Cooking odors. I wonder if a small one would work in the airplane? Or would the ozone damage some stuff?

Really old airplanes smell of 80/87 gasoline. Younger folks don't recognize it. A tiny fuel seep can stink up the whole airplane for a long time.
 
I agree. The club 182h has a certain olfactory patina this is distinct. Not bad. But distinct.
 
Leather seats and new (or cleaned) carpets will help. I put new carpets and side panels in our Piper Cherokee a few weeks after buying it and it had that "new car, well plane" smell for the first flight. After the first flight it just smelled like dog as our dog pretty much joins me on every flight and he has never been accused of smelling pleasant lol.
 
I think a large part of it is the avionics. Those old radios have a certain smell. I always wondered if these guys who get new glass panels still get that. My Lance has a little electronics smell, and a little avgas smell, especially if I just topped her up.

The archer was a bit more musty thanks to 10,000 hours of butt sweat and cfi coffee.
 
I think leaks (fuel, oil, and water) are the primary culprits for the odors. Some aircraft stink so bad that you can just about pass out when you stick your head inside, mostly from fuel.

I maintain and operate a dozen aircraft of various ages that don't leak and don't smell. Guess I'm missing out.
 
Dan Thomas said:
Ozone generators are used to get odors out of houses. Pet poop and pee. Smoke. Cooking odors. I wonder if a small one would work in the airplane? Or would the ozone damage some stuff?

Really old airplanes smell of 80/87 gasoline. Younger folks don't recognize it. A tiny fuel seep can stink up the whole airplane for a long time.
Click to expand...

I use ozone machine all the time… I have heard it’s hard on plastics, but haven’t seen it… maybe in absurd concentrations but they do work!

it’s basically gaseous peroxide… it’s O3, the odd number of O makes it unstable the odd ball O detaches and uses the corrosive action of O to eat the odor…
 
I think it’s largely the interior. I fly a Cherokee 180 that recently got all new interior (carpet, sidewalls etc). It smells more or less like a new airplane now.
 
Huckster79 said:
I use ozone machine all the time… I have heard it’s hard on plastics, but haven’t seen it… maybe in absurd concentrations but they do work!
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The plastics in airplanes are usually half-shot anyway. But one wouldn't want the windows or the electronics affected.

Old electronics: yup. I learned, when a teenager, how to fix TVs and radios. They all had a special odor. Vacuum tubes got hot and heated everything else around them. Coils, capacitors and resistors all had their odors. The old selenium rectifiers got hot too. The bakelite tube sockets gave off that burnt-electrical smell.

Odor is one of the most powerful memory stimulants. The first things you remember are often the most evocative. I remember first the odors of dandelions, weeping willows and wild morning-glory flowers. The place we lived when I was tiny was next to the sawmill my dad worked in, so the odors of spruce and pine are also significant. The stink of 80/87 takes me back to my first flight lessons.
 
Navions usually have a mixture of 5056 and 100LL as their dominant aroma.
 
Dan Thomas said:
The plastics in airplanes are usually half-shot anyway. But one wouldn't want the windows or the electronics affected.

Old electronics: yup. I learned, when a teenager, how to fix TVs and radios. They all had a special odor. Vacuum tubes got hot and heated everything else around them. Coils, capacitors and resistors all had their odors. The old selenium rectifiers got hot too. The bakelite tube sockets gave off that burnt-electrical smell.

Odor is one of the most powerful memory stimulants. The first things you remember are often the most evocative. I remember first the odors of dandelions, weeping willows and wild morning-glory flowers. The place we lived when I was tiny was next to the sawmill my dad worked in, so the odors of spruce and pine are also significant. The stink of 80/87 takes me back to my first flight lessons.
Click to expand...

Yea I’ve used it in my old suburban that sat n got stinky, but yea I don’t think I’d risk airplane radios myself…

I’ve read that too that smell is the most powerful memory recollector… and yea smells do take ya places from the past
 
Always thought it was over-heated polyoxybenzylmethylenglycolanhydride.
(Had to look up that name to look impressive, it’s Bakelite. If they used it in airplanes; not sure.)
 
When I bought my plane, it had a distinct odor of butt sweat and old socks. First thing I did was take out the sheepskin seat covers which got rid of 90% of the smell. Since then I've completely replaced the cloth interior with leather seats and side panels and installed new carpet and fixed the leaky fuel selector valve and brake system. That was 5 years ago. She smells like leather and bananas now. The banana smell is in the leather conditioner I use.
 
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I still prefer the smell of new electronics.
 
Whatever you do don't try one of those little tree air fresheners. I just found serious damage in my car from one of them contacting hard plastic trim. It was there for about 1-1/2 weeks, then I saw it.... don't know how long it took to happen but it was quick.
The very thin top layer has blistered up maybe 3mm or so
 

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