How to Dry Carpet Padding

If your carpet padding has been wet for more than 24 hours, there’s a really good chance your padding is already infected with mold and it might not be safely salvageable. Drying your carpet padding isn't a complicated procedure, but it will take time to adequately accomplish.

1. Turn on the air conditioner to begin removing moisture from the air and carpet padding. Put on your rubber or work gloves and a pair of safety glasses.

2. Retract the carpet over the wet area of the carpet padding by using a pair of pliers or a carpet puller to grip the carpet close to the baseboard of the wall and pull it away from the padding. Use the pliers to pull the carpet from the tack strip near the wall. You may need to remove carpet staples near the wall if a tack strip wasn’t used. Use needle-nose pliers to grip the staples and yank them out of the carpet.

3. Fold the carpet away from the wet carpet padding. Use the wet/dry vacuum to suck as much water from the padding as you can. Stomp on the padding with a clean shoe to force water to the top and vacuum it away with the wet/dry hose. Keep all electrical cords away from the water or wet padding.

4. Sprinkle the wet carpet padding with baking soda. The baking soda will absorb odors and moisture.

5. Set up a box fan in front of the wet padding, but not on the wet padding. Mixing water and electric appliances poses a risk for electrocution. Open a window for ventilation. A fan will move the air around, but won’t dry up the wetness by itself. Allow the padding to dry out in the circulating air.

6. Vacuum the baking soda from the dry carpet padding and spray the padding and bottom of the carpet with spray disinfectant. Replace or remove the carpet over the padding.