Hello! I bought an amp and cab, second hand, but it stinks, if you know what I mean. So how can i remove those nasty odors from them? Its disgusting to play when i remember my grandmother´s wardrobe while im on it.
If you prefer the smell of stale beer and dirty ash trays. A few gigs at a local dive should fix you right up. Perhaps if you will tell us what the amp and cab are covered with, someone will offer a helpful suggestion to speed the transition. I have heard Murphy's Oil Soap is good for cleaning tolex...probably not an ideal choice for rat fur...maybe Febreze. Eventually it will smell like IquanaFish. Then you will love it for sure .
Baking soda is supposed to be good at ripping odours out of stuff. Maybe put the rig in a wardrobe for a few days with an open box of baking soda.
Sit an open bottle of beer on top of it and turn up the bass ... It will automatically remove the old people smell and replace it with a beer smell... works every time.
If ass hair, vacuum first, the Fabreze, let dry, repeat several times... If tolex, clean it with a spray cleaner. Windex, etc. and brush, then wipe down...then ArmorAll, Fabreze the grill cloth... If you have a drum air cleaner, stick it and the cab in a bathroom for a day or so... Depending on cab size, AFTER CLEANING, you can fill a couple of coffee filters with fresh grounds, zip tie the filters closed and sit em on cab and slide a big commercial trash bag over the cab and leave it for a day or so at the time... Grounds will pull moisture and odors... I use Fabreze and grounds with old guitar cases.....
On a more serious note, sunshine. I'm not joking. Whenever it's a pretty day where you are, set it outside. UV light takes care of more than you can imagine. If the problem is extreme, pop out the speakers and set it where the sun shines down into the cab. Open up the amp so the sun shines into the guts. I'm serious. I was gigging back when there was smoking in all the clubs. Sunshine gotnrid of all the stale beer, smoke, and bad perfume buildup. Sometimes it takes a day or two.... or in extreme cases three.... to get the job done. But it works every time. Be advised. Depending on the source of the smell, tue first day of sun and fresh air may make the smell WORSE. It's somehow "working its way out of the gear". That's the only way I know to describe it. But after the second or third day of bright sunlight your smell issues should be resolved. Just make sure there aren't neighborhood pets waiting to replace the smell with something else.
Don't go spraying anything into the amp, otherwise you will end up with a bigger problem that will make you wish your amp just smelled. Time will help the smell dissipate.
I was going to say spray the amp guts with a mixture of bleach and salt water and put it out of its misery.
What do you mean by "on it". Are you sitting on the thing you are playing? Maybe position yourself in front of it were the odor is not so strong.
^ that might account for Edro's weirdly specific question, which has to it (ahem!) a whiff of hard-won experience. I *don't* wanna know how he knows this...
I've heard that spraying lemon and vinegar mixed with water and drying it in the sunshine does wonder.