Prewashes aren’t what they used to be. The old Preen aerosol was based on 1,1,1-trichloroethane, the solvent used in dry cleaning. So when it came to getting stains out of clothing, there wasn’t much it wouldn’t shift.
But those days are long gone. These days they are all water-based, with the main cleaning agents being enzymes and oxidisers. These are both high-performance additives which, depending on the concentrations involved, do a good job of removing food stains, vegetable and animal oils and fats, dirt, urine and other biological matter.
But they’re not so good with industrial stains – engine oil and so on.
For this, you want some Kenco:
And it’s even packaged in a spray bottle for you. Keep it in the laundry, and it’ll do a bang-up job of getting industrial oils and greases out
It will, but by a different mechanism. But I don’t think it’ll work quite as well, and will also leave a residual smell afterwards that may not easily wash out. The beauty of the alkaline-salt based products like Kenco is that you can wash them in the washing machine afterwards and get 100% washout
If I use “Diggers white spirits dry cleaning fluid” on bearing grease stains on my work shirts, will that do the same thing as the Kenco degreaser?