Your car may have been owned by a smoker, at the last dealership that I worked in one of owners sons had a real problem trying to get rid of this type of smell,(he got the job cause he phucked up everything else)he ended up using something like glen20 or similar.
is it worse on humid/wet days if so I would be chasing a water leak also try removing trim and giving it a bloody good airing in the
sun
Ade

Old car smell is great, I think they should bring out an air freshner that smells like it.

Im sure that some of the smells are never going to come out.

I worked at a toyota dealer in the used car section for a couple of years.
I remember an 80 series that had a real strong spew smell. Even a detail it didnt get rid of it.
We ended up getting a 4litre bottle of air freshener,put in a spray gun & emptied about 3 pots & dont open the doors for a couple of days that got rid of it. if you have or can get a spray gun it wont cost a lot of money.

here's how I got rid the old car smell



Quote:
yeah, the 1988 Patrol I bought last year smelt like a new car. Go talk to a car yard detailler! I'm serious, I bet they'd have a few ideas.

I'd say between carpet and seats is where it's at, think about 30 years of sitting on vinyl seats in summer in stubbies shorts, becaus ethats all you could get in the 70's that and 30 years of farting, think about it. foam smell

and the back part of the rear seat has that organic fibre in it and if that got damp in the years that could start to rot and smell. get the interior re padded and re-trimmed and you should be okay. good excuse ofr some funky new seats from a late model car.

Good thread!

I find that the seats and carpets are the biggest contributors to "old car smell". The odd errant McDonalds French Fry can also be to blame sometimes.

My recently finished Datto smells like a "new car", with the smells from the carpet and seats filling the car with the nice smell of freshly moulded plastic and fabric glue.

So it's not impossible to regain the "new car smell".

Dead animals stuck in the suspension are also bad for smells. As are fishing tackleboxes left in the boot on a hot day.

ps.
My old green datto used to stink. It smelt like a pile of sweaty jocks, left inside a warm room for a few days with no ventilation. Everytime it would rain the carpets would get wet, and the car would seriously smell bad. I used to have to put up with smelling like an old man most of the time.

Have you tried febreze? I've got rid of some pretty amazing odors with it.

Im also not a big fan of the old car smell but mine has a strong smell of fuel which im sure cant be good wherever thats coming from but it also just smells old and i think its hard to get away from that.

new carpet, retrim the doors and dash, new seats should fix it, it fixed mine. it used to have old house carpet and brown vinel, very ugly