I love my Lange Comp 100 Alpine ski boots dearly but the liners are totally offensive to anybody in a 5-mile radius when I remove them.

Is there anything I can do, can they be washed? or do I just have to buy some new ones?

I am regularly (once a season, always at its end) pushing my “stinkies” (MFC inners of Dyna TLT4) thru the wash-machine (at 40deg, C, Atsko Sport Wash added). No issues whatsoever.

That’s great news to me, 5-years worth of stink to wash away :-(

Does the sport-wash do anything special? or will a good dose of regular washing liquid do the job?

Apparently Baking Soda left in the liner overnight will remove thermoliner smells.

In similar vein - Milton’s sterilising fluid / tablets.  Available in the babies sections of supermarkets, drug stores.  Dilute in cold water as recommended for babies’ feeding bottles and leave liners to soak in a bucket overnight.

Sport Wash does not contain softeners (as commercial wash agents do).

Well, they’re in the wash right now on 30deg with a small amount of non-bio washing fluid and an extra rinse cycle but no spin as I was afraid that may be too violent for them.

I wasn’t sure if an 800 spin cycle was more aggressive than my skiing or not

Will update you all on whether I trash them or it’s a success

I’ve never washed any and put up with it on ski boot inners and mountaineering boots for ages but I just use one of the deodorant sprays now and it works a treat. I think the science of it is pretty simple in terms of what makes the smell and how to neutralize it. I can’t think of the make we use but there’s a few around. Apparently a lot of these organic compounds, like cat pee for example, are quite easy to neutralize with the right formula.

davidof - 31 January 2010 11:49 PM

Apparently Baking Soda left in the liner overnight will remove thermoliner smells.

that’s the sort of thing I was thinking of above, the smells are from organic acids like carboxylic acids, the smell goes by converting them to carboxylate salts using sodium bicarbonate or baking soda, IIRC the theory. I probably don’t but it’s something like that.

I had to take a crash course when the cat scented some haul bags the day before leaving for a Himalayan trip

LINER UPDATE

They’re washed and have been drying now for almost 24hrs on a low temp on the radiator on top of a towel. The cat piss smell has gone but I would say they smell more ‘neutral’ than of roses now. Perhaps I need to also try some of these odour neutralising methods.

I also discovered that the outers didn’t smell too great either and just gave them a soapy wash with the liners out to make some difference

If you have the time, pop each liner in a plastic bag, seal it, and put in in the freezer overnight. The smell should disappear as the bacteria will be killed off. Thaw out liners before use