Are you using respiratory protection? If so, what type and when?
If you have been pressure washing for over 5 years and do not wear protection, do you notice any impact on health or breathing?
- Never
- Always
- In some situations
0 voters
I have a respirator from harbor freight. It does the job. I’ve done acid washing of my pool and a few power washing jobs with it. But I rarely wear it. I’m curious as to how this will affect my health long term. I would love to hear from some vets about the affects it has had on them.
I get into the habit and then summer hits and I can’t take being so hot. Will it affect our health? Yes everything we breathe, touch, etc gets into our bloodstream, hits our liver and kidneys and for us spraying, our lungs. SH is highly corrosive no doubt corroding our innards.
I need to start be more proactive before the COPD hits followed by liver and kidney failure
I only use respirators on roofs and some screen rooms . 3m seem to work the best
My partner asked about this yesterday after getting a good whiff of SH on a housewash.
I Use a 3M pink respirator for a hood vent job when spraying degreaser in a confined area. I used to wear the respirator for house washes but have gotten away from it this year. I think if I did roofs I would wear one all the time
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I read this a while back. Made me wonder.
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I wear a 3m respirator with pink filters (mold remediation filters) for anytime I’m spraying sh, no matter how weak or strong. Didn’t use to 14 years ago when I first started, but man, do I notice a difference! Even if it’s hot outside, I have no issues breathing through it, so long as I put fresh filters on every so often. I think some of the breathing issues some guys have are more so mold spore related than they are sh related though. Forgot to wear it one day while pump spraying 50/50 on a few stone neighborhood entrance signs, and I was hacking for 2-3 days afterwards. May have been the heavy mold, or may have been the sh. Either way though, to me, personally, I think it also helps you to appear more professional, while possibly saving your innards. Then again, sh, on a molecular/ionic level, doesn’t actually permeate porous surfaces very well, which is why you can’t just spray sh on black mold growing on sheetrock and be ok. Granted, your lungs are much more susceptible and delicate than, say, your skin. Sorry for such a long post, guys. I generally post to the Facebook group, but anymore, giving advice over there is just throwing pearls to pigs…but that’s a discussion for another day, or just not at all lol!
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I’ve never used them and have noticed any problems. I also don’t do roofs, just ds homes.
I use the 3M respirator when doing roofs, but not for house washes. Occasionally i will wear a paper filter mask when doing a house wash and that helps keep the small SH particles from entering the lungs
With a house wash, because i tell the customer what we use is “safe” if they look out their window and see me wearing this huge mask, It no longer looks “safe” and they may be wondering what chem im really spraying, so i prefer not to wear one.
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I tell my customers it’s safe for the plants as long as you presoak and rinse. Can’t do that with your lungs. I also tell them that since I’m washing all the time, I don’t want to be breathing in the soaps or sh all the time too. They’ve always understood. Smoking a pack of reds just once ain’t gonna hurt you, smoking a pack 3 times a day, 5-7 days a week will. I’d be interested in seeing a study on the effects of breathing in sh and different detergents all day in varying concentrations.
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Like most guys here, I use the 3m respirator with the pink cartridges on pretty much every job. It’s def a pain in rear, but having a wife and 2 kids puts things into perspective.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IF7RCU6/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I prefer these
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For house or roof washing Steve? Thank you .
I use them for both but if I’m in an enclosed area during a house wash or on a really hot roof that’s giving off a lot of chlorine gas, then I’ll switch to the rubber respirator with filters.
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Are these rated for vapor?
