I recently traded one of my atv’s for a bran new North Star trailer 4gpm 4000 psi with 2 hours on it. Previous owner said it was to much for what he needed it for, my question is why am I peeling off so much concrete to where it looks like fresh concrete was poured, it’s at my house and nothing to major but has some stripes, I’m using 1/2 gallon of sh to 1.5 Gallons of h2o and my throttle is in turtle mode. I plan on advertising for driveways and restaurants drive thru but want to know if it’s normal for that much ‘concrete water look is normal’ when surface cleaning.
Give us a bit more info. Are you using a surface cleaner or the wand? Which nozzles/tips are you using? How old is the concrete?
A couple of points that should absolutely be covered before you ever wash anything:
- Verify that your unloader is functioning properly
- IF your machine is belt driven you need to check the belt tension. You should be able to depress the belt(s) about 1/2" give or take in the middle of the belt.
- Make sure that you know the pattern and orifice size of any tips you’re using. If you are BRAND NEW to powerwashing do yourself a favor and throw the red tip in the gun safe and forget about it. It will do a lot of damage when used inappropriately. Holler back.
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Trade that yeti for a surface cleaner, use that turbo nozzle for curbs, and not sure why you would throttle the machine down.
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Forgot to touch on that.
When you decrease throttle you also decrease flow. Reducing flow reduces cooling of the motor/pump. Most small engines are designed to operate at near maximum throttle. Also, it is very intriguing that you are achieving any decent amount of pressure with your throttle so low.
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Yea don’t use the turbo on open areas of concrete. Curbs or small concrete borders. You also don’t want to use 4K psi on concrete. That’s your main problem. Buy a surface cleaner and buy nozzles that will put you at 2500psi.
How much did you end up getting the unit for? Are you utilizing the hot water or just using cold? Do you have any before pics?
It has 2 hours on it because it’s a terrible set up. I’ve seen that unit at my local Northern Tool…if it is the same unit it has a 4gpm direct drive CAT pump attached to a gx690. I’d go with a larger gear drive pump to pair with that engine.
But then the how water unit wouldn’t keep up. So don’t do that… unfortunately for most uses you won’t need hot water. It’s a nice option to have though…
Looks like he has a surface cleaner in his truck bed. Residential concrete you’ll only need 2500psi as was stated…any more and the creme can come off. Commercial you can use more psi as long as it’s not brand new concrete. You can put 25025 tips in your surface cleaner to lower your psi. However using 4gpm for commercial work…especially drive thru’s is rough…even with hot water. I tried it with 4gpm at a few Jack in the Box stores…takes way too long to rinse.
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I seen a post awhile back stating that’s what you should do I guess. And I did purchase a surface cleaner from the local northern tool, and also a turbo nozzle. Just concerned me when I did the wash after that there was that much creme of the concrete coming off. Wouldn’t throttling it up more cause it to have more coming off?
Thanks for the info, I just got the trailer as a starting point for a little side business, I’m a cdl driver for shamrock foods but looking to have an additional income for weekends an after work. Not the best set up for sure but for the deal I couldn’t pass it up brother.
I traded a 2008 Yamaha raptor for it, title for title, quad was in excellent shape but even then nada value was only like 3500, the trailer is bran new so I figured I kind of came out on top being I plan to use this as a steppingstone in the pressure washing industry.
So if I put 25025 tips into my surface cleaner, I should be able to turn the throttle on the motor to the (rabbit mode) and expect it not to just tear up the concrete. My driveway is about 8 years old by the way.
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That is a good deal for all of that equipment. And you will be able to do commercial jobs especially with how water…it’s just slow with 4gpm. I believe that setup was around $8-9k new so a good deal for only being used that long. I took some cream off of one residential driveway and I’m running about 2300 psi with 5.6gpm and 200 ft of hose. It’s rare but it can happen even with a lower psi. I’ve done many driveways with 4k psi/4gpm and not touched the cream so you just never know. It’s good to leave the idle on high and not touch it. You can lower the psi with nozzles or orifice sizes for tips. If you search “nozzle chart” on here you find the correct nozzle sizes to lower your psi to what you want
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Thank you for the responses and knowledge everyone has given me, I will take it and run with it. It’s nice to be able to reach out to someone who knows what they’re doing in the field of work.
Also this is the current surface cleaner I’m using, would this have anything to do with the issues I’m having?
Nothing wrong with that surface cleaner at all. I had the General version of it for 6 years and it worked great. The bearings eventually locked up. I put a new bearing cartridge in and keep it as a back up. A lot of guys new to the business don’t bother looking at the tips in a surface cleaner before using it. The tips have to match the machine you’re using. Many of them come with 2502 tips which is meant for 4k psi/4gpm pumps. 25025s or maybe even 2503s with your sized engine will put you around 2500 psi which is all you need for residential concrete. A supplier once told me that Northern Tool surface cleaners sometimes come with zero degree tips in them which would definitely strip the cream off…but that might be the smaller surface cleaners they carry…not sure. But I would check them before doing any more work with it.
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Thank you for the valuable tip on that, I was begging to get discouraged about it, and I just checked and it has a spare set of tips in the box, and they are labeled 25025 so I am going to install them and do I back yard to experiment. Thank everyone for the great uplifting advice!!
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Let us know how it goes. I too have a 4gpm/4K psi washer and would like to know how those tips do for you.
I put those 25025 tips in, and did my neighbors back yard area because he just had a party last weekend and the concrete got real nasty, I did it with just 1/2 gallon of sh and 1.5 gallons of water, and pump sprayed back yard area let it sit while I ran my hose to the back and surface cleaned it, no signs of creme coming off the concrete at all or any stripes, thanks to @Barry1 for the recommendation. Waiting on it to dry currently and will post some before and after pictures.
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