THis driveway looks dirty to me, after I cleaned it. I kept looking at it the entire time I was doing it, something seemed off. I didn’t change any of my methods.
backpack blow off gravel, grass, and dirt/leaves
blow out expansion joints with water to each edge
soap/wait
surface clean
rinse first section
surface clean
7 rinse second section
8 surface clean
9 rinse third section
10 do my walk through looking for lines or missed/too fast spots, rehit sections, rinse.
This was clear water running at the end, no dirt, and no, I didn’t see grey water when washing.
As some background, homeowner previously pressure washed it (I saw missing cream at time of estimate). There are gouge marks from the snow plow, in the concrete. The broom patterns were very odd from the git go.
This thing was flithier than it looked. I spent a lot of time rinsing it working the dirt down the drive.
I figured if I had time to type here I could go back to the jobsite and look at it again. It is a little whiter than that last pic, but not like night/day difference. There is a lot of missing cream although you see the broom marks from the finish.
If you think that is odd, check out the porch concrete. Told him I would wash it for the price I quoted, but I wasn’t fixing it or removing rust/brick dust/whatever it was.
Thanks. I’ve never post treated a drive to date. I may go up there tomorrow and hit it with a pump up. I know it is clean, it just doesn’t look clean. I think he took off too much cream between his PW and running his plow over it. That metal on concrete wears down cream quickly.
On a side note, I don’t think I have had a nice piece of concrete to clean since I started this gig. Between metal shovels, plows, salt, and homeowner PW them, most of the ones I do are missing cream on them. I see way more asphalt than I do concrete.
Funny, I actually thought about washing that concrete today.
The Navy taught me to go inside when it is raining, and the Army taught me that if it isn’t raining it isn’t training. I’m conflicted every single time.
Yeah, I’m glad I took before pictures. You can see all the lines in it before I started, not the broom marks but the lines. He did say he used a spinning cleaner.
wow, I really thought without winter, plows, and salt, that your concrete down there would be better. I had this idea that other than a few places the homeowner ruined it with a PW, the rest would be white as snow after a cleaning. Learned something new today.
Sounds good, I don’t care what they paint it with…“we can’t clean the ‘old’ off, but you can certainly paint it after we get rid of the organics & dirt” is all I’m getting at
On a side note the homeowner finally came back home and we chatted, he was happy with the outcome. He wants me to do the inside of his 3 bay garage at the end of fall now.
Thanks for the pics. I can be a panicky pete when I clean and it doesn’t look right to me at the end.
