Beginner Pressure & Soft washing rig

1

My Starter Pressure Washing + Soft Wash Setup (Predator 4400 / 4.2 GPM)

Hey everyone, just wanted to share the basic rig I’m putting together for driveways and simple house washes.

I recently built my own double-RO waterfed window cleaning system, so putting equipment together and plumbing stuff in isn’t a problem for me. I’m just new to the pressure washing / soft wash side.

Pressure Washer & Surface Cleaner

  • Machine: Predator 4400 PSI / 4.2 GPM gas pressure washer

  • Surface Cleaner: WOJet “18 inch” surface cleaner (I’ve heard it actually cleans about 16")

I went with 4.2 GPM so it can run the surface cleaner well and still have good rinsing power.

Water Supply

  • From the house spigot I use a 100 ft Flexzilla garden hose to feed clean water into the pressure washer.

  • This hose is clean water only. No chemicals go through it.

High-Pressure Side

  • Planning to run about 100 ft of 3/8" high-pressure hose from the machine to the gun/surface cleaner (rated 4000–4500 PSI or higher).

  • I’m not sure how much hose I really need yet. Is 100 ft enough for most houses, or should I be looking at 150–200 ft so I don’t have to move the machine as much?

At the end of the hose I want a ball valve + quick connects so I can switch between:

  • Regular spray gun/wand

  • WOJet surface cleaner

Soft Wash Setup

For soft washing, I’m starting with a simple DIY setup instead of a full skid:

  • Tank: Around 50-gallon drum used as a batch tank (water + SH + surfactant)

  • Pump: 12V bleach-rated pump around 7 GPM

  • Power: 12V deep cycle battery

  • Hose: Soft wash hose (around 1/2" and ~100 ft) with a ball valve or soft wash gun on the end

  • Filter: Strainer on the suction line in the tank

I need this soft wash system to reach pretty high sideways so I can hit tall, narrow 3-story beach houses. A lot of these houses are close together, sometimes only about **5 feet apart so i need to make sure nothing hits someone else’s plot.

Im just wondering what everyone thinks and for the pressure hose do i get a 6000psi rated hose or a 4000 psi hose, and what do you guys recommend i switch up, i have a truck but its pretty small i don’t have a trailer yet so this will all be in the back of the truck bed. Also what am i missing anything important? like some attachments that make it so much easier to do jobs efficiently and quickly**

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Welcome,

to jump right in…

•what diameter (inner) is your clean water supply hose? 3/4” or 5/8” should be plenty

• what’s the flow rate of house spigots in your area? If it’s 4-5 gallons a minute then no problem. But if it’s less, the you’ll be starving your pressure washer and you’ll need to consider a buffer tank that you haul around with you from job to job.

• 3/8” pressure hose - 100’ may work for you in your area, but i found myself routinely using 150’ (I did a 100’ section and a 50’ section connected together). But I always had a spare of each ready to go, meaning that I had the couplers already installed on them so that in the event of a blown hose it’d only take me less than five minutes to be up and running.

• pull the washer off the cart if it’s wheeled, and mount it in the truck bed. You don’t want to be lifting it in and out at each job.

• perhaps I missed it, but do you plan to x-jet or down stream? Downstream injector and jrod tips will vary depending on length of 3/8” pressure hose.

• ladder?

• cones?

• tape and plastic bags to seal off areas that don’t need to get wet?

• pump up sprayers ( 1-2 gallons)

• replacement tips (the plastic multi colored ones) that reduce your exiting water pressure to what you need it to be instead of 4,000+ psi

• waterproof shoes

• bleach resistant clothing

That’s enough for now I suppose.

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The amount of hose depends, are you keeping the pressure washer on the truck or trailer, or keeping it portable? I don’t do much on the pressure washing side, so my 4gpm is still on wheels and I’ve found most of the time I only use a 25’ supply and 100’ of pressure hose. I have a 3/4” x 100’ if I have a big job, so that gets up 200’ from the house and I’ve never needed more than that.