How to easily clean and bleach the white rubber sole of your favorite sneakers?

Sneakers today can be called the most popular shoes that young people are ready to wear even with a business suit. However, the time comes when the owner wonders: how to clean the white sole? Despite the apparent practicality and convenience, it is quite difficult to take care of such shoes. Unlike boots, which can only be treated with a brush and cream, shoes with rubber soles, especially white ones, need to be washed. But even if you wipe your sneakers after every walk, the problem of dirty soles will not go away, because without thorough cleaning they simply turn yellow!

The easiest and safest way to restore the whiteness of the sole is to take it to a dry cleaner, where they will not only scrub the rubber to the color of snow from the top of a mountain, but will not forget to clean all other areas. As a result, you will receive sneakers in almost perfect condition.
If for some reason you cannot turn to professionals, then below are several popular ways to whiten sneakers and sneakers.

Advice
Before returning the sole to white, wipe the shoes with a damp cloth. This way you will remove stuck and dried dirt, all that remains is to eliminate the unpleasant tint.

Methods that are rarely used

A washing machine is the easiest, but essentially the most useless way to clean shoes. Sneakers and sneakers are loaded into the machine in a disassembled state: without insoles, laces and other removable parts.The washing mode should be selected delicate with the lowest number of revolutions. After the procedure, the shoes are dried naturally or using special shoe dryers. Drying with a hairdryer or near a radiator is strictly prohibited: this leads to deformation. It is unlikely that you will wear “chewed” sneakers after this.

Disadvantage: it is almost impossible to bleach shoes to their original condition.

The eraser is the strangest and most tedious method. However, it works, meaning you will get white soles without using any water. The disadvantages include the amount of time you have to spend on whitening. And your hands will require care after this. One pair of shoes requires a fairly large eraser, but if the sole is grooved, you will have to use small pieces that can whiten the thinnest and smallest grooves.

The most effective methods that will return the sole to its original appearance

Cleaning products can be used. They mean:

• toothpaste;
• dentifrice;
• washing powder;
• baking soda.

Each of these means has its adherents who claim that the others are no good. However, regardless of which powder or paste you choose, the process itself is the same: using a brush, you rub the product over the sole until it turns white, then wash off the remaining product by wiping with a damp cloth. Most often, the result depends not on the cleaning agent, but on how hard you scrub the sole.

Advice

An old toothbrush with fairly stiff bristles is best.

If bleach works on clothes, bringing them back to their original whiteness, why not try it on rubber? Before using this method, apply a drop of the product to an inconspicuous area and wait at least an hour. Many bleaches leave cracks or pores on the sole, which makes it very fragile and wears out quickly. But if no such problems arise at the test site, then dilute the bleach with water according to the instructions. To achieve the goal faster, it is better to use a dose twice as large. The shoes should remain in this solution for several hours; every hour you can take them out and see if the soles are white enough. By the way, only the sole should be in the liquid, but not the upper part of the shoe. Liquid bleach can not be diluted with water, but simply applied to a damp cloth and wiped over the surface.

Advice

Use rubber gloves to prevent the product from corroding the skin on your hands.

Acid or acetone works in much the same way as the previous method: first try the product on a small area, and if there is no visible damage, proceed with a full cleaning. Apply the liquid to a damp cloth and wipe the sole. In cases of using citric acid, it is better to use a toothbrush and do not dilute the powder with water, only rinse off the residue at the end.
A recipe for a solution that will help whiten soles: water and table vinegar are mixed in a 3:1 ratio.

Is it always possible to wash sneakers?

More often than not, even the dirtiest sneakers just need a good cleaning to make them look like new. This can also work with older shoes where the rubber has turned lemon-colored. But, unfortunately, yellow color cannot always be cleaned even in dry cleaning.

Usually the dirty yellow tint is due to dust and ingrained dirt. This is easy to fix. But, for example, if you constantly dry your sneakers near a radiator, the soles will also turn yellow, but you won’t be able to bleach them. The same effect will occur if the sneakers are left in bright sun for several days. To avoid this, be careful with your shoes and wash them often.