How to Clean a Jiffy Steamer

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We love Jiffy brand steamers – they’re made in America to a very high standard. They aren’t the prettiest machines, but what they lack in looks they more than make up for in craftsmanship, durability, and user satisfaction.

Related: Best Hat Steamers by Jiffy

Cleaning Your Jiffy J-2 or J-2000

But as awesome as they are, like any machine they need cleaning from time to time. In this article we’ll describe how to clean the Jiffys we’ve reviewed so far – the J-2, J-2000, and J-4000 (see below).

Step 1

Unplug your steamer. But you knew that already because of the time you tried to get your toast out of the toaster with a metal knife…

Step 2

Remove the hose attachment and water bottle. Dry off any water that’s lying around. Check the hose for any build-up that might be causing a blockage. Now’s a good time to clean it out. Blast any sediment away using a garden hose.

Step 3

Pour 10 ounces (a bottle) of Jiffy Steamer Liquid Cleaner into the water cup of your steamer (where you put the water bottle). What, you don’t have any? Tut, tut! It’s super useful and will make your Jiffy steamer as good as new.

Jiffy recommend letting it sit for 3 hours, but for best results you should leave it overnight. Don’t turn the steamer on!

Step 4

You should notice that all the build-up of calcium, hard water sediment, limescale and whatnot has been greatly reduced – pour away the solution.

Step 5

The liquid cleaner is acidic, so now you need to give your steamer a proper rinse. Jiffy suggest rinsing it out 2 or 3 times, which seems about right.

Cleaning Your J-4000

With the J-4000, the steps are similar, except you don’t unplug it right away. Instead, add a gallon of water to the tank, pour in a full 10-ounce bottle of liquid cleaner, and switch the device to ‘preheat’. When the pilot light (the red one) turns OFF, switch off the steamer, unplug it, then leave it overnight.

Pour away the solution, then rinse.

A Video Guide

This video isn’t about Jiffy products but there isn’t a video that shows how to clean a Jiffy steamer – for me it was useful to see the process even if my steamer looks different to this one.