CLEANING CORDURA® CASES
By Ken Barry of K&H Products, Ltd.

Now and then, people ask us for advise on cleaning Porta-Brace® cases. As we recondition older cases, we have accumulated quite a lot of experience on this subject, so we thought we would pass along to you what wehave learned.

First, a word on what not to do. Don't try to clean your case in a washing machine. It won't hurt the materials, but it will beat up the case as a whole and distort its shape pretty badly. Dry cleaning, too, seems to be out of the question. We have been told by people who have tried that dry cleaners won't accept padded cases.

Anyway, there is no need for a machine to clean a Cordura® case. For removing accumulated dust and grit, a good going over with a regular vacuum cleaner with a venetian blind attachment will brighten things up. We also use a brass bristle brush-the kind sold in super markets for scrubbing pots and pans. Cordura® is tough. A vigorous brass bristle brushing won't hurt it.

For dirt that will not simply brush off, we use upholstery cleaner with applicator, which we buy at an auto supply store. We use it according to the manufacturer's instructions and find that it does a good job. Any stains that the upholstery cleaner won't remove-such as spots of tar, etc.-we can usually get off with lacquer thinner (available in hardware or paint stores). We keep some in a small bottle with an applicator, but it can be dabbed on with any piece of absorbent cloth or cotton, and then wiped off. Lacquer thinner will not harm Cordura® nylon or interior foam padding (paint brushes with nylon bristles are used with practically all common solvents), but it should not be used on vinyl, so keep it away from clear vinyl windows and don't use it on white balance cards.
To clean vinyl windows and white balance cards, we use either soap and warm water or the kind of hand cleaner that you can buy in auto supply stores-the kind without grit. Gritty cleaners will scratch vinyl and should certainly be avoided in cleaning clear windows. "Novus" Plastic Polish will do the job for cleaning plastics and clear vinyl, and it's available at art supply stores. However, cleaning the removable white balance cards with a bar of (gritty) Lava soap will give them a "matte finish" that may be quite practical.

Once your case is clean, you can spray the Cordura® with a water repellent product like Scotchgard® (made by 3-M and widely available), which will cause water to bead up on the fabric and will help to keep it clean. However, this will not make the case much more waterproof than it already is, since the real waterproofing is the urethane coating on the inside of the Cordura®. The only thing that you might do, if you are a stickler for waterproofing, is to treat the seams with Seam Seal (the gooey stuff that comes in a tube, sold by those who sell tents and rain gear). But generally, this too is unnecessary. The cases obviously are not designed to be immersed in a river, but they are designed to shed rain effectively without further treatment-even when dirty.

In fact, if you like your case just the way it is, proudly wearing the dust and stains of long and faithful service, there is no reason to think about cleaning it at all. You can save yourself the cost of a brass bristle brush and a can of upholstery cleaner.

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