Im new to the group and wanted to say hello as well as get some feedback on something. My company does house washing and roof cleaning (80/20, respectively). For the past year, we have been doing house washes with the same rig that we use for roof cleaning…5.5 gpm diaphragm pump powered by a 12v deep cycle battery which draws from a tank that we manual mix the solution in on site. The solution is pumped thru 200’ of chemical line to a gun with a nozzle pack. We have no high pressure machines whatsoever. The setup works great but I would like to expand into driveways, concrete, decks, etc., while also making our system more efficient overall. Putting the SH thru these diaphragm pumps multiple times per day causes them to have a very short life span, even with a daily clean water flush. So I have decided to keep the current setup strictly for roof cleaning and switch over to a 4gpm belt driven machine with a downstreamer to use for house washes. With my current housewash mix, I have a mix 26 gallons of water with 4 gallons of SH (12.5%), which gives me something like 1.92% SH hitting the house. It works perfectly. Im trying to figure out how to achieve that same percentage hitting the house once I make the switch to a downstream system. Since I am currently making the mix manually and then just feeding it thru a pump, there is no question about what Im getting out of the nozzle. But with the new method, Ill have a 4gpm of water coming from the machine and then straight 12.5% SH coming thru the downstream. Im not even sure how to calculate what that will yield in terms of the % of SH to the house. Any thoughts on what that will be and how I can maintain my current 2% to the house? Thanks guys!
I see some of these guys downstreaming using 8% SHE. SO that means they are getting less than 1% to the house? I wouldn’t even think that would be effective…
I’m putting between .5% and .8% on siding, with great results. I dwell for 5-7 minutes, with really bad growth occasionally requiring a second (or, very rarely, a third) lighter application to keep the solution wet and extend the dwell time. I can continue washing other areas while the solution sits, so I’m really not wasting time with it.
How long is your dwell time? What types of siding are you cleaning?
But that’s different because it operates at much higher pressure. A downstream injector after your pump is different because people won’t laugh/cry/insult/question/comment when you use it
No change according to gpm unless you’ve got the wrong sized injector for your gpm… then you’ll get a lower %
Anytime you change pump, make sure your downstream injector is the correct size
Carry a spare downstream Injector, they work hard and do wear out
Drop the intake tube in a bucket of fresh water at the end of a job for a minute. Flushing out the alkaline SH from the metal injector will help it last longer.
Hello everyone. i am new to this business and this form, i have been pressure washing for a few years and i absolutely love it. I recently started up a power washing business and purchased a 7x16 enclosed trailer , 3500 psi 8 gpm pressure pro , 325 gallon tank and a 4 nozzle whisper wash surface cleaner. what els do i need to get off my feet? I am also using the down stream injector that came with the pressure washer. i was wondering what ratio do i need to use for house washing. i was looking at 10.5 % sc for 2.49 a gallon from my local walmart. do i need to cut it down or can i use it straight with the 8 gpm?
That sounds exactly like my current process. Dwell time is 5 to 10 minutes and occasional have to get a second shot on bad areas. This applies to vinyl and metal. It’s very rare to get anything other than that. Brick obviously requires a stronger mix. I’m just now thinking about that. My current setup allows me to just add more SH to my mix if I need to. Can’t do that with d/s. Hhmmm…
What market are you in? Walmart in my area doesnt even sell 10%, only 8%. I use 12.5% and get it from a pool supplier. They give me 15% off everything but its still around $5.50 per gallon.
Walmart in my market doesn’t even sell it in the pool section. They only sell powder shock for pools. Theyou have bleach in the cleaning section but it’s only 8.5% I believe.
