I accidentally washed a white towel with oil-based paint on it with a load of towels. Now my towels and washer have oil-based paint all over them. How can I get rid of the paint on the inside my washer? Help.
I am assuming the paint was not dry, otherwise it wouldn't have gotten all over things. If it is house paint, I expect it will dry quite soon, which may be a worse situation. You could clean your washer with whatever you are using to wash your brushes, but then you will have to clean that out. Another possibility is to use Dawn dishwashing liquid. I have used dishwashing liquid to clean out artist paint brushes, which have much more oil in them than house paint. I use it straight on the brush, and work it in well. I think it might be worth a try on the washer. Soak a cloth with it, and see how well you do with the clean up. It certainly won't hurt anything.
If the paint has finally dried, the problem may have solved itself.
I would assume that if you leave the door open and let it dry it won't come off anymore.
If you have to get it off, the only way to loosen oil-based paint is to use paint thinner or some other sort of stripper. I would hesitate to put any chemicals that may linger in the dryer since it gets heated up, I wouldn't want to have an explosion.
Although I assume if you were to get the paint off with paint thinner, then wash out the inside of the dryer with a cleaner and let it throughly dry you should be ok.
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