Not crazy about how this fence turned out. This is the alley-side of my inlaws fence, so I did some experimenting before staining it this week.
Pre-wet, sprayed with a pretty strong bleach mix. Wood didn’t fur up much, I just don’t feel like it looks clean.
Those of you who actually know what you’re talking about (Mark), what are your thoughts?
@tireshark @MDA1775 @Racer what do you guys think?
One of those things is not like the other. 
I am nowhere near their level, im probably just a few steps ahead of you, hah.
Yeah it looks like it might could be a bit better, especially the last pic where there are still dark spots on the cleaned side. What PSI were you rinsing with?
I just got in a bunch of wood tips and some wood chemicals, and am going to do some more testing soon. I’ll be using more PSI this time, based on Racers input, as well as some other vets.
40 degree tip on my little 2.5gpm 3000 psi machine, but I was spraying from 24+ inches back. Just enough to agitate the surface a little. I’ll make a trip to northern tool tomorrow and get some different tips.
All the discoloration seems to center around those cross timbers. And the dirt on the bottom is years of kick-up from it raining into the mud.
Was hoping to get by with chemicals and light washing only. Lots of jobs I’ll be doing are like this. If I have to cover every sq ft with the wand, my profits will go down.
40 degree is the fan pattern, there should be small numbers on it that are the orifice size, that is what tells you the PSI at the tip. Yeah you probably need to be a lot closer. Like Racer told me, you can be more aggressive with yellow pine, if that is what the fence is. 1000-1500 PSI for yellow pine, cedar is more like 600-800 (1000 maybe).
Northern Tool might not have the tips you need, i dont know how extensive their inventory is. For your machine you need a #4 orifice for 1500 PSI, 1000 PSI is a #5. You want a 4004, or a 4005. Then you want to be about 6 inches off the wood and do full strokes up and down the boards. Pressure Tek has them if Northern doesnt.
Figure out the price per hour you want to make, then figure out how long it takes to clean the fence, then charge accordingly. You will get faster the more you practice.
Without writing War and Peace… First of all this fence is more than a little past its prime, this is one where you need to set the expectation up front. i.e. it is not going to take a transparent stain and it is not going to look like a new fence no matter what you do. There are parts of it that look pretty good, around the gate for example. The part around the runners is always problematic on older fences. The top side gets hit with everything and the bottom side gets hit with very little. It looks like some of it is still wet in the pics or that something was applied to it at some point in the past, hard to tell form the pics. Realize it will look “cleaner” after it is completely dry since the bleach will continue to work on it. Keep that turbo nozzle off the fence…lol. When they are just gray the bleach will do whatever can be done with it, hitting it with pressure will just strip more lignin out of the wood and the bleach already does that to some degree. It’s a very fine line to walk between clean and destroy on older fences. Only experience will help you improve and even when you have done hundreds of them you’ll still screw one up now and again.
That fence will look ok with Sable Brown, Sierra or one of the other darker semi-transparent stains. Your only other option is a solid and an HVLP sprayer (you could roll it but that would be a whipping). Any solid will make that fence look ok but now you are painting with a film product. I do a number of them a month but only because the people got screwed by someone before. Putting film on the first time is easy, reapplying it correctly is a PITA.
Overall a good first time out of the gate, so you know I never PW a fence that has not had a film product on it. I use hose pressure during the rinse and in combination with the beach that is all I have ever needed to clean one like this one.
Damn it I still wrote too much.
Josh,
Ok, not too bad. Yes, where it’s dark, you could have hit with a little more mix. some areas you may have to. You could definitely used a little more pressure. 24" way too far. A good rule of thumb is hold wand far enough away to roughly cover width of one board with spray pattern on a 1 by6 board. If you think you’re going to make a 2 ft swath and get it done, need to find something else to do. All the bleach is doing is killing the mold and bleaching. You need to knock off the old wood to some degree. If if furs a little bit, no big deal, it’s a fence. Many are rough sawed anyway but unless real bad the furring will lay down in a few days anyway. Decks different.
On one that old and bad would be a lot closer to the 1500psi. Reason you need to charge accordingly. Realize to replace a 6’ tall wooden fence about $10-$12/ LF for yp at least. So on a fence like that I’d be at 1.25+ per LF per side just for cleaning each side. That’s not including the staining.
I’d take a section or two and go back over at 1500 with distance I told you and then let’s see how it looks after it dries.
Here’s a video that Shane put up. He was using a 4000 4gpm in this video with 40deg tip. As you can see it’s long tedious work and this is cedar which is lighter pressure, probably about 800psi in this one, and that fence not that bad. Notice it sometimes (usually) takes 2-3 passes over a board to get it clean.
You didn’t say whether you brightened or not. After you wash, then brighten and then you can rinse that off with a garden hose.
I should have noted those swirl marks weren’t from me! No idea where they came from, but my history as a carpenter has at least served me well enough to where I’d never scar up wood like that. Even if I did, I certainly wouldn’t have danced around the face of the fence like that guy did!
We had planned on doing a semi-trans brown color from WD anyways, hopefully that will cover most of it. The inside of the fence (yard side) looks significantly better, I’ll post photos later after the wood dries from the rain.
This being the alley side, I’m not terribly worried about it. I did, however, want to make sure I used this opportunity to learn, since it’s a long section that the only people who see it are the trash guys.
I will take the opportunity to play around with pressure washing it today. But like you said, this fence has seen better days. With it being cedar, I don’t think it’ll hold up to the pressure required to get it looking new. My main worry were those extremely dirty sections - I wonder if they’ll show through the stain.
Thanks, gentlemen!
Soon as the weather clears up, I’m going to grab some new tips from NT to lower the psi and hit a few inconspicuous areas. Actually, this being an alley fence, the whole run is pretty much inconspicuous.
I still want to do this as well as possible though, first because it’s the right thing to do, and second, all the neighbors who come out to throw away their trash are potential customers.
My NT has a whole display with tips of every size. I just hadn’t taken the time to figure out which sizes I needed. Thanks!
@jhamby i’ll go to pressuretek right now and buy you the tips you need if you promise me that you’ll stop spending money at Northern Tool. LOL
@squidskc meh, NT has its place. I know the value of a name brand - I own a $1,500 sanding setup from Festool. This is not to say I haven’t made plenty of mistakes, but I try to research every purchase before spending my money. NT had the tip I needed at a price I was willing to pay, and I didn’t have to wait for shipping.
All that said, I took all of your advice and finished the fence today. Hit it with a turbo nozzle at 3000psi. It took forever and there are streak marks everywhere, but I’m happy with the results.
Just kidding 
40060 tip at a 6" contact width did wonders. A few overlap marks here and there where I got lazy, but nothing the stain won’t cover.
I like this guy.
Nice dude! Good work. I wasn’t joking about buying you the tips, but I was kind of joking about spending money at Northern Tool. I’m still bitter over a warranty fiasco and the fact that they screen their reviews.
Not important. Great job on the fence man!
Yeah, I can’t think of anything I’d buy from them that is over a few hundred dollars. Oddly enough, they have great prices on Shurflo pumps, at least at my local one.
You’ll like my rig build post. Just wait for the first guy who takes it seriously 
Huge improvement Josh. Racer has a good point about the increased cleaning charge if you do have to PW the fence. It is very time consuming and I personally hate doing it. People don’t want to pay that much, at least not in DFW. There is too much competition and guys that will do “something” on the fences for a lot less than I will. I do get to redo their work in about 18 mo sometimes so it works in the long run. Keep at it, you’re on the right track.
Just gave a quote for another job, and I was thinking about offering to stain the playground as well. Does PT wood accept oil based stain well?
1,548 square feet in total. I told her .15sqft to clean it and .45sqfoot to stain. Sound about right? Total estimate came out to $928. I estimate material cost will be around $350.
Wow. I am constantly amazed.
I think you’re leaving about $1500 on the table… I just subcontracted two decks and the painter charged $2500 to do both. I think his going rate is $2.00 sq foot.
