A few months ago we purchased another Billy bookcase from IKEA to go with our already existing Billys in the lounge room. Within a few days a strange smell became obvious in our lounge room. I can only describe it as a mix between perfume and vinegar. On cool days you could smell it a bit but on warmer days it was very striong and sometimes I even gagged a bit upon entering the lounge room. I thought it might have been our old leather chesterfields giving off a whiff or the books themselves but then my wife had a theory it was the bookcase. I emptied the bookcase and put it outside and sure enough the smell was no longer in the lounge room. I left it outside for a few days where it baked in the hot sun and cooled off in the evening. I could smell it strongly at the exposed bits of the particle board. We have put it back in the lounge now but the smell is still there, although not as prominent.
I was perplexed by all of this, so today I Googled it and found this page:
http://www.ehcd.com/websteen/sealing.htm
and this:
http://www.theage.com.au/cgi-bin/common ... 13383.html
Has anyone else experienced weird smells coming from their IKEA products or other particle board items?