# Strange smell in house



## Capaill (15 Nov 2005)

Hi folks

Hopefully someone can guide me in a direction to help solve this problem.  For the past number of weeks we have experienced a strong musty odour in the house, primarily in the hall, stairway and main bedroom.  We have looked everywhere to see if we can find the source of the smell but to no avail.  

The odour is similar to a strong male BO smell but there are no clothes or any other items lieing around to give of the smell. 

I have checked the attic and other cubby holes to see if there is a dead rodent somewhere but cannot find any.

Can anyone
(a) Advise as to how to track down this odour
(b) Failing the above are there any companies that speciliase in this area?

Thanks

C


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## Vanilla (15 Nov 2005)

Do you have a bath shower or sink in the area that is rarely used? I find that when my guest bedroom ensuite hasn't been used for a while, a smell starts to come from the plughole in the shower. If I turn on the shower for a bit and put some detergent down it, it clears up again.


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## Carpenter (15 Nov 2005)

Capaill said:
			
		

> Hi folks
> 
> 
> The odour is similar to a strong male BO smell .................. if there is a dead rodent somewhere but cannot find any.
> ...


What kind of men do you know? 

As Vanilla suggests it may be an unused/ little used sink or wash basin etc.  When unused over a period of time the water seal in the trap can evaporate, allowing odours to enter the room in which they are situated.


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## hansov (15 Nov 2005)

Check the light fitting. Sometimes over time the plastic/ceramic light holders start to melt/heat up and creates a pretty strong smelly (!) odour. We had the same problem once, searched the attic for dead anythings(!), luckily no bodies were found. Eventually noticed the odour only really happened evenings/night-time and tracked it to the fitting. 2 or 3 euro sorted it! Good luck.


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## Capaill (15 Nov 2005)

Thanks Hansov had not thought of that and will check out the light fittings.

I don't think it is an unused sink or wash basin as they are all actively used.

Thanks for the replies

Carpenter
"What kind of men do you know?"
Big smelly ones<g>

C


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## dosfromclare (15 Nov 2005)

Sounds like (smells like  ) a dead mouse to me. If so look under all furniture, heaters etc or wait a week or two and it will go away.


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## ribena (17 Nov 2005)

I would agree with dosfromclare, sounds just like a dead mouse.  I will never forget that smell in all my life!  We had a dead mouse two years in a row in one of our bedrooms.  There was a hotpress in the bedroom in question and lots of mouse poison in the attic so the little rotter would literally rot in the hotpress!  We had to take absolutely everything out and shake them out and wash everything.  The main problem is that they dry up in the heat so they turn minisule after a while and are very hard to find and one year we weren't succesful in findig it and subsequently had to put up with the stench for months.  Good luck if this is the case


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## ClubMan (17 Nov 2005)

I smell a rat here!


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## hansov (17 Nov 2005)

Ah Clubman - that's so cheesy  !


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## Seagull (17 Nov 2005)

I thought cheese was associated with mice rather than cheese.


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## daithi (17 Nov 2005)

Give Rentokil a call and see if they have any ideas..daithi


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## hansov (22 Nov 2005)

Capaill: Any news on your problem?


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## upgrader (8 Dec 2005)

Hi Capaill

*Just wondering have you found the source of your smell?*
I am also having problems with a strange smell in my house.It comes infrequently (not every day) and is mainly in 2 of the upstairs bedrooms and it is stronger on windy days.Have tried everything to find the source.The smell is hard to describe,a kind of musty smell.

The latest thing I tried was to block any unused copper pipes (I converted my heating from oil to gas 2 years ago and the there were pipes going from the fireplace back-bolier to the immersion upstairs that are no longer required).I was told stale/stagnent water or air would cause a smell.I thought this was going to solve the problem but it wasnt the source.

I am now going to get the chimney cleaned (the chimney goes up along one of the bedrooms) and then I think I will have to take up the floor boards in the bedrooms.

*Does anyone have advice or know is there are specialists available?*

Cheers


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## Sue Ellen (8 Dec 2005)

Upgrader,

Have you checked out the light fittings as mentioned in Post 4 above.  We found there was a horrible smell in one of the bedrooms and it was indeed the light fitting.  I think it comes from cat gut(?) which is used in the fitting.  When this gets old the combination of it and the heat is dreadful.


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## Thrifty (8 Dec 2005)

When i got my house there was a faint but horribly, stale smell in the main bedroom. I though it just needed airing as it had been unoccupied for a while. The carpet badly needed changing but i was leaving it till i got heating installed. It was only when i split water on it that i realised the smell was worst and that it was actually the carpet that was reeking. Its been changed now and has cured the smell problem but before i never realised how mush a carpet can retain an odour.


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## Capaill (8 Dec 2005)

Hi Folks

Apologies for not replying sooner.

Believe it or not I found the source of the problem to be Mrs C's training shoes.  They had developed a strong odour over time.

The hard part was convincing her she was the source of the problem<g>

C


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## upgrader (9 Dec 2005)

Thanks for replying guys.
The smell is coming from the floorboards,both bedrooms have the original boards.It is bugging the hell out of me!


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## Thrifty (9 Dec 2005)

Can you pinpoint the worst part and pull up the floor board. Might be able to cure the problem if clear out under the floor board.


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## wheeler (8 Jan 2007)

I have a bad smell in my sitting room at the moment. I think it might be a dead mouse (or something similar) under the floor boards. What I'm wondering is if in fact the smell in your house turned out to be a dead animal and if so was the smell you were getting like gas?


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## hansov (8 Jan 2007)

whelanfiona: If your house is piped for gas and you think you smell gas well my advice would be to look for the Bord Gais emergency number and call them first. NEVER assume it's something else when you are smelling gas!


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## johndoe64 (8 Jan 2007)

whelanfiona said:


> What I'm wondering is if in fact the smell in your house turned out to be a dead animal and if so was the smell you were getting like gas?


 
We had something similar in our old house, called the gas board and they sent someone over straight away, he checked the meter for pressure and we had no leaks, he reckoned it was more than likely a dead mouse somewhere that was causing the smell he said he had seen it loads of times before.

Better to be safe than sorry though, call them in just in case.


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## wheeler (9 Jan 2007)

Maybe I should have said this already but the complex is not piped for gas. Nevertheless, I did call them out in case the neighbours had a free standing gas heater or something like that but it turned out that the smell was definitely not gas.

Basically I came home one day and thought I got a faint smell in the living room but ignored it. When I got home the next day I though the smell was getting stronger. But by day 3 it almost knocked me out when I opened the door. It took a couple of hours to get over the headache it created.

But since then it has thinned out again and at this stage it's a lingering smell. That's why I think it points to a dead 'something' under the floor boards... plus the fact that the floor boards were up for a few weeks for maintenance work and then resealed.

The smell came about a week after they were resealed. But at the same time I had the house painted so it could be that too. 

I have called a maintenance guy out and he thinks that it's either a dead mouse or the paint put on the wall had 'gone off'. But he was really only guessing. I checked the paint tins and they are def. for interior use so it's not that the wrong paint type was used. 

Rentokil didn't really have anything to say except to quote me 220 + vat to check it out.

Anyway - I'm thinking of getting the floorboards taken up to check for a dead body now but my question is if that is worth the trouble. Can I just ignore it at this stage as it seems to be disapating (slowly)? Is there any harm in having a dead carcass under the floor boards?


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## polo9n (9 Jan 2007)

The smell may be there for few months..where exactly the smell coming from? between the ceiling?


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## wheeler (9 Jan 2007)

No.. I can't pinpoint it really. It's only in the living room and it seems to be coming from over near the window but it's not coming from outside. 

At that point in the room there is a socket and a tv and all the ntl stuff and that's it. 

The house has been cleaned from top to bottom during the painting so there's def. nothing visibly causing the smell, like discarded food or clothes or something like that.

I guess the best thing is to get the floor lifted again and at least look. I'm kinda happy to go with the mouse under the floor boards as it fits around what has been happening there lately. I've been living there for over a year now and this is the first time I got the smell. None of the neighbours have it.


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## polo9n (9 Jan 2007)

unfortunate, but thats the best solution...get it out...hope its not the builder who left something there


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