Ford, Toyota, General Motors and others have trained teams of sniffers who evaluate smells and then reject or reformulate any unpleasant materials. It's a daunting task: Car interiors are made of dozens of different odorous materials - plastics, foams, rubbers, carpet, fabric, leather.
— From Love the new-car smell? Automakers don't. at The Washington Post. The article includes some interesting details about cultural differences in smell preference. Many thanks to March for the link!
I’ve never had a new car so I don’t really know what they smell like. But this is very interesting.
What I like is the smell of leather seats on expensive old cars. I once had the chance of getting a lift in a beautiful Daimler: it was heaven.
Edit: ‘in expensive old cars’
Scroll down here:
https://nstperfume.com/2006/03/28/fragrance-everywhere-scented-hotels-scented-cars-scented-convenience-stores-scented-phones/
About Rolls Royce, not Daimler, but explains how they use fragrance to get that “expensive car smell”, LOL…
Mad Magazine proposed a spray called “New Car Kick” in the ’60s. The picture showed a man spraying it in an ancient jalopy.
Then they discovered that somebody was actually manufacturing an aerosol spray that smelled like new cars.
When I said, ‘I once had the chance…’, I meant in 1969. I think it was the real thing, then. LOL!
Shouldn’t the real issue be not whether the materials smell unpleasant, but whether those smells are actually bad for you? If that stuff smells, it means it’s still off-gassing, and a lot of those fumes are at least somewhat toxic. Even leather — what we think of as the smell of leather is mostly the smell of the noxious chemicals they use to cure and tan it. Still love my “leather” scents, though!
In which case the smells are doing you a favor & reminding you to air out your car…
Can’t they bottle that “new car” fragrance and sell it as perfume or cologne? They could come out with different kinds of new car fragrance…”New Ferrari” “New Bentley” and “New Mercedes” are some of the ideas that come to mind…
http://www.amazon.com/Lanes-Car-Products-Leather-Scent/dp/B00061NQXG
http://www.amazon.com/Chemical-Guys-Leather-Scent-16oz/dp/B002J858HQ/
This has been an issue around our house lately. We have plenty of experience with that new car smell…the American new car smell that is –the CEO drives a new company car (part of a product evaluation program) every six months…new GM cars always smell like leather and plastic to me but it’s not great, and it’s not offensive, but always the same. On the other hand last summer we got a new Mini Cooper for our daughter—which is NOT made in the US —it smelled VERY different! I noticed a lot of astringent and ammonia type odors. It had open windows in the garage for months (but now smells more like Amouage Dia than anything) –It was disturbing and I had no idea why this one car smelled so very different inside…now I know. Thanks
D: Maybe you can get a gig as a “trained sniffer” and convince them to start putting some vanilla into the mix or something.
Now I know what to use to get that 10 year old car + toddler cereal smell out of my Saturn: some nice Dia…. ha, ha. Daisy, that’s pretty funny.
….that’s a lot to ask of a little decant…even if it is Amouage. Maybe start with some activated charcoal in a cloth bag…
When I acquired my parents’ 10-year-old minivan, it had a strong smell of stale cigarette smoke. Neither I nor my husband smoke or care to smell smoke. I got rid of the stink by carrying around a couple bags of cedar mulch in the van for 2 or 3 weeks. It really did work, and it was free. I use cedar mulch in my garden anyway, so after the car was deodorized, I just put the mulch in one of my flowerbeds.
that’s a fabulous idea….and cedar mulch smells pretty good on its own too!
This is a great idea! I would probably refuse to buy a used car (used anything, really) that smelled like smoke. Good to know that there’s a way to remove the stink.