Hi guys, a general contractor I do a lot of work for sent me these pictures of tire marks on a wooden boardwalk, haven’t come across a job like this yet.. Boards are not composite, not sure what they are. They’re part of a boardwalk near the harbor. Tire marks are from a lift. What’s the best way to remove them without damaging the wood?
Looks like IPE wood to me….pretty durable stuff.
Was thinking the same.
Normal process for washing wood. Ipe can fur up so plan on sanding, or at least let them know it might need to be sanded. If they want you (or someone else) to stain it, let them know the stain will only last a year on ipe.
If you’re concerned, do a test spot first.
Worst case, the tire marks can be sanded off though to keep it uniform might require a decent amount of sanding.
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Sand down a whole boardwalk??? No way they would go for that. I’d bet a simple degreaser and stiff deck brush will remove enough of that to be good enough for what it is. This isn’t a deck on a million dollar home
I’d be very concerned about discoloring the wood with a degreaser.
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Normal process for washing wood. Ipe can fur up so plan on sanding, or at least let them know it might need to be sanded. If they want you (or someone else) to stain it, let them know the stain will only last a year on ipe.
If you’re concerned, do a test spot first.
Worst case, the tire marks can be sanded off though to keep it uniform might require a decent amount of sanding.
Respectfully, I don’t think this is ipe. I prrrrrobably do more ipe than anybody on this site (last month I did ~5,000 sq ft). I live in the land of ipe 
Here in the picture is more likely a more local hardwood which cleans similarly but not identically to ipe. Ipe is a particular species, brazilian hardwood, and has a pretty distinctive tiger striping. You could tell real quick by looking at an end grain. I would think we have here is white oak or black locust or something in that spectrum. The complete lack of knots makes me think its almost certainly not pine.
Pine furs, ipe doesn’t. Ipe can usually tolerate 1,500 PSI but if you try to put that on pine it will most likely fur and you’ll need to sand.
My usual method for cleaning ipe/hardwood is:
wet everything down and apply SH/surfactant/NaOH and hit a quick stiff bristle brush across the surface just to agitate the NaOH and break the crust
Let it dwell no more than 5 minutes before you start and work in sections that you can finish in 5-10 minutes (you can’t really do big 300 sq ft chunks at a time unless weather condis are very favorable)
Then I pressure wash (preferably run a surface cleaner over it) around 1500-1800 PSI, depending on the exact type of hardwood I may go up to 2,000 PSI. Finish by giving a citric or oxalic brightening pass and final rinse
Come back next day to oil
Last point, sanding will create a differential spot that even with the utmost care to blend will always stand out. If you sand one spot, you have to sand the whole thing.
PS in this case with no visible organic growth I may substitute the SH for sodium metasilicate or sodium percarbonate (@OutsideCleaner who is a master of this kind of cleaning highly recommends this in place of the SH).
PS @Nickski listen to @qons do not spray the boardwalk with degreaser!!! You might get the tire marks off but you’re trading tire marks for chemical haloing 
Ipe doesn’t fur like pine. That does look like a hardwood. I feel confident the tire marks don’t do down into the wood, most likely just on the surface? Did they just take off the grayed wood layer?
Give us some more info if you get a chance.
Maybe just needs to be cleaned well. I’ve brushed in sodium percarbonate and medium pressure rinsed with great results on cumaru. I would go that route way before putting any degreasers on it
I think they just took off the dead wood, as you can see the tread marks where they didn’t remove that nasty grey. There might be tire marks where they turned it too tight, but that would be small. Doesn’t look damaged, looks like they just showed how neglected it has been. That is how I would advise the contractor, then see if the owners will buck up for the whole thing getting a quick redo.
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