So, a couple of summers ago I let my brother drive my black 3rd gen for a few weeks. Well, he somehow managed to spill a quart of oil in my trunk. It soaked into the trunk mat and didn't make much mess other than that.

We removed the trunk mat and the trunk mat has been sitting in my garage ever since.

Well, the stupid car STILL smells like oil, and it's been two or three years now (and the trunk mat still has never been put back in). It's almost like the oil smell somehow penetrated every pore of material inside the cabin.

Anybody have any ideas here? I guess I'm just stuck with it.

 

gasoline cleans it up well but just not sure if it would discolor the mat

 

I guess my first post didn't make sense. I'm not talking talking about the mat.

The mat was removed and hasn't been in the car for over two years. The whole cabin itself smells like oil even though the oil was ever only spilled on the mat. The smell somehow permeated the whole cabin

Cleaning the mat would do me no good because the mat isn't even in the car.

 

thats what i meant too, that the oil from the mat leaked onto the surface underneat, so clean that up.

 

As a guy who had close to a gallon of cooking oil spill onto his cabin floor, I can tell you that most of the smell and greasiness went away once I took dish washer, sprayed it all over the carpet, spilled some water in there, took a brush to it, then took a nice big sponge, started soaking everything up little by little. Had to repeat.. I guess you could try cleaning where the oil actually spilled which you probably have, or at least try using some dish washer soap to cover up that area. Id also start leaving a crapload of air fresheners everywhere and keep spraying febreeze all over the interior. Leave the windows open alot. Overtime it may get better. Just some ideas..

You basically want the bad smell molecules to get replaced or out numbered by the good ones

 

On your knees, and start scrubbing.

 

Also Ozium is a pretty strong spray. Try spraying that area as well.