How To Clean Moldy Wood Cabinets: Advice for homeowners

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Are you annoyed with musty wooden furniture in your house? However, you haven’t found out how to clean moldy wood cabinets. Let’s read this article!

Recently, the wooden cabinets in your home have started to appear moldy stains. You don’t know why there are those mold marks on your cabinets.

Will those stains be dangerous to your health? The answer is yes.

If you expose to wood mold, you can get some diseases such as sore throat, coughing, sneezing, fatigue, or watery eyes.

So, how to clean moldy wood cabinets? In the article below, we will answer all your questions.

Let’s get started!

Why are the wood cabinets moldy?

Here is some issue that causes wood cabinets moldy:

#1. High humidity

One of the leading causes of moldy wood cabinets is caused by steam. If it is a kitchen cabinet, the reason may be due to its flawed ventilation system.

As a result, this makes the kitchen’s temperature too high, and the space becomes humid. If this situation persists, it will create favorable conditions for mold to grow.

#2. Erratic climate conditions 

Another cause of mold in wooden cabinets is the climate. Especially for areas with unusually hot and humid weather, it creates condensation on the interior surface.

This creates ideal conditions leading to mold in wood cabinets in particular and other wooden furniture in general.

#3. Improper moisture resistance

Typically, samples of wooden cabinets during the production and construction process will be treated with standard impregnation and drying as well as a coating to protect against harmful agents such as water and moisture.

However, many small manufacturing factors often skip this step to save construction costs.

Consequently, this prompts the cabinet to deteriorate quickly and causes the cabinet to be attacked by mold.

Because of these reasons above, you need to know how to get rid of mold smell in cabinets in general and in wood cabinets in particular.

How to clean moldy wood cabinets?

Are you curious about how to get rid of mold on wood cabinets? Let’s jump right away into the essential steps below to clean mold from wood cabinets.

Cleaning will promote the health of your house and prevent persistent stains on the cabinet surface.


#1. Check if the affected wood part can be dismantled

First of all, you should check if your cabinet can be taken to pieces.

If it is easily assembled, let’s remove it to make cleaning more accessible and more in-depth. Also, you should clear everything inside it and take these things outside.

#2. Making cleaning solutions

After checking the wood cabinet through a turn, let’s start making detergent solutions.

However, before making a cleaning solution, you need to prepare things like rubber gloves, dust masks, spray bottles, rags, scrub brush, old toothbrushes, chlorine bleach, and a fan.

Since fungi are so harmful to your health, you should always make sure to use protective gear while cleaning mold.

Once you have the above shielding clothings, start making the cleaning resolution! All you need is to mix 1/2 cup of chlorine bleach with 1-quart warm water and fill it in a spray bottle.

However, there is an important thing you must keep in mind that you mustn’t combine bleach with ammonia or any product that contains ammonia.

The reason is that bleach and ammonia mixture can produce toxic and sometimes fatal smoke.

#3. Spay cleaning solutions onto the surface of the cabinets

Next, you spray the created solution over the fungal area. Make sure the area is covered with all detergent.

If you don’t have a spray bottle, you can use a wet cloth soaked in the solution to scrub the affected area.

You should then leave for 15 minutes for the detergent to penetrate deeply into the wooden cabinets and kill the fungus roots.

It is worth noting that you had better desist from spraying too much solution because it may create wet plashes or runoff while mold thrives in humid environments.

#4. Scrub the moldy area

After spraying the cleanser on the entire surface of the cabinet, you should use an old toothbrush to scrub and get into nooks and hard-to-reach moldy areas.

Keep scrubbing until you sanitize all the mold on the cabinet surfaces. Then, you should rinse one more time with warm water and cleanser to thoroughly eliminate fungi.

#5. Let the cabinets dry

The final step is making the wood cabinets dry. Usually, it takes about 6 to 8 hours for the wooden cabinet to dry completely.

You can let it air-dry under normal conditions. In case you want to accelerate the drying process, it’s time to use a fan.

You have to be sure that after the six-to-eight period of drying, the wood cabinets are completely dry unless fungal sprouts are very easy to reproduce and grow in a humid environment.

After following all these above steps, your moldy cabinets are still improved, let’s book a professional cleaning service for sure.

Wrapping up

Above is how to clean moldy wooden cabinets.

With the above suggestions, the homeowner will indeed have the most beautiful, durable wooden cabinets and open room space, helping the homeowner have good health and happiness.

We do hope you will be successful with the preceding recommendations!

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