You’ll never get that smell out.
We bought a used Volvo on eBay. The car stank of cigarettes the day it was dropped off at the house. We got some of the smell out but it never was the same as a car that hadn’t been smoked in. If you don’t care for the smell of old cigarette smoke, skip that car. We tried everything. You can improve it but that car will go to the crusher stinking of old cigarette smoke.
That car had daily exposure to smoke. Day in and day out, pack after pack, year after year, windows up, smoke repeatedly saturated the air everywhere in that car, every part of the car, not just the exposed surfaces, the back side of every panel, the insulation, the headliner, everything under the dash, behind the dashboard, it permeated and put deosits on the speakers, it saturated the plastic wiring, the seat cushions, the air conditioning ducts, the rubber seals, the leather, the fabrics, all of it. There was wave after wave after wave of concentrated tars and smoke. The inside of the car took it and took it. Now it will release that stored stench, most at first then a little less and less later as the car ages. But there is plenty.
Nothing destroys that odor. Your nose is exquisitely sensitive, just a little bit of that outgassing cigarette deposit and you’ll be aware of it. They can scrub surfaces but they can’t get that foul gummy residue off all the buried surfaces. You can leave the windows open, run large fans in there for months at a time to try to accelerate the diminishment of that smell, and it will diminish, but you won’t ever get rid of all of it.
There is nothing magic about baking soda. Fabreeze won’t touch it. Vinigar, commercial products, little mirror dangly pine things, Pine Sol, you can try it all but that smell is relentless. We put an ionizer in there, we tried charcoal. That smoker absolutely soaked that car’s insides in cigarette smoke and there is enough deposited there to last the rest of that car’s useful life.
I’d love to be wrong about this. I’m not, though. I never smoked. I hate that smell. After that cigarette stinking Volvo, I’ll never again buy a car that has been a smoker’s car.
