The only reason I am entertaining this is my Broker asked me. He has these on his property and they need painted. As you can see, there is a lot of peeling paint and some oil runs. I do not have heat and only a 2500 psi machine with 150’ of hose…so maybe 2300 ish? Figured it would need treated with EBC. I need to speak with the painter about what he expects prep wise but am wondering if anyone here has ever tackled this?
I’ve washed hundreds of tanks on production sites. Granted, they were all in much better shape than those. You could do a couple of things: Try to use your machine and just douse them with straight degreaser and then turbo tip the entire things. May take a while. Or, you can rent a larger hot water machine and essentially do the same thing but it would be much faster and more productive. Or, do an initial scraping then degrease and then wash.
Also, EBC is good stuff but for a job like this I’d probably get the store bought stuff. Nearly as good and less expensive. The degreaser will have no bearing on the finished product in this case.
I tried to paste a zoomed-in pic of the one with the big oil streak… Where is that oil coming from there? That tank might be REALLY thin right there, with a pinhole leak
Dont forget you gotta clean up all the paint you remove that may be a bigger job than you think
Try one of those sand blasters you hook to your pressure washer. I’ve always wanted to try one. Looks like the perfect job to give it a go.
I hate to tell you this but that is a job for a media blaster. Around here guys run them for 125-150 an hour plus travel time
Turbo nozzle with heat,but cold will work,just takes longer. I DS HF on them to get it paint ready then DS a good caustic soap or a good degreaser to neutralize the HF for safety drainage. Have them at least primer them as soon as there done ,because it will start to rust again. My 2 cents,also HF works better @100 degrees or lower.
METHYLENE CHLORIDE (on sale now at HD) with a pump-up sprayer, 15-20 minutes to dwell and blow that sh$t off with your PW. Send me a $50 check made out to Catholic Charities to feed the homeless in Norfolk, VA. Follow through and I’ll give you the keys to the kingdom.
