Pressure washers.

UffDa

UffDa

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I have been looking for info on pressure washers. A local guy wants to wash my house for only $500. It really needs it, but that seems a bit much. I thought about renting one, but the ones at the rental place weigh around 200 lbs, so that's out of the question. I have been looking at some of the better quality electric washers. Those seem to be the most practical washers for me since it would be used infrequently. What I need to do is wash bat poop of the side of my house. I just want to wash it and not strip the paint. What I want to know is how much pressure will clean the paint without damaging it?

I looked at some of the pressure washer forums. Most are for commercial applications and those for homeowners don't answer my question. Any experts out there? :D
 
My dad paints houses for a living and uses a gas powered washer, if he wants to keep paint on, he sprays from a further distance. This washer will strip your skin and muscle right off!

My buddy uses an attachment for his garden hose to clean his house. He got it from a home improvement store, really cheap. All it does is funnel the water, making pressure. Works well.
 
HwangJino said:
My dad paints houses for a living and uses a gas powered washer, if he wants to keep paint on, he sprays from a further distance. This washer will strip your skin and muscle right off!

My buddy uses an attachment for his garden hose to clean his house. He got it from a home improvement store, really cheap. All it does is funnel the water, making pressure. Works well.
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I have one of those garden hose wands. It doesn't do the job on bat poop.
 
Ah, must be some hard poop!
In some places, bat poop fetches very high money.

You could hammer it off and sell it as fertilizer?
 
HwangJino said:
Ah, must be some hard poop!
In some places, bat poop fetches very high money.

You could hammer it off and sell it as fertilizer?
Click to expand...

It's more like brown streaks. If you want it, you can remove it for free. ;)
 
I have two gasoline pressure washers at around 3500 psi. Electric will handle washing down paint on your house and just about anything else at half that rating. I used my pressure washers to clean the concrete at a new house that I was building in the Caribbean so there is algae all the time. There are also bats... everywhere.

Bat droppings will stain and may require scraping or scrubbing. Some detergent with bleach scrubbed onto the droppings works well but may affect the paint.

Gasoline is great when you need power and mobility but keeping that carburetor clean is a pain.

I say get the electric.
 
What color of paint? It might be permanently stained. You could try using a brush/push broom and scrub it with tsp and then rinse with your garden hose.
 
sykes3170 said:
What color of paint? It might be permanently stained. You could try using a brush/push broom and scrub it with tsp and then rinse with your garden hose.
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It's kind of tan.

I have scrubbed the walls several times. The slurry of water, detergent and bat ppop runs down the handle of the brush and down my arm. That's not very pleasant. :barf: That's why I am looking into a power washer.
 
An electric pressure washer would probably do the job but one of the biggest problems with the electric ones is that the hose is usually pretty short. I've only used electric ones a few times but I'm usually pretty careful about where the power cord is in relation to where I'm spraying water. I prefer gas and for occasional use tje cheap gas ones will last a long time and you can use them anywhere, no need for a power source. If the paint is tight I've never seen any pressure washer peal paint, you do have to be careful of areas where the wood might be soft though, they will take chunks of wood.
 
Have had a couple electric pressure washers. Best one by far so far is the Sunjoe 2000 psi pressure washer. The weakness of electric pressure washers other than psi (and 2030 is plenty for most things) is heating up the pump and it's cracking. I bought mine from Hammacher Schlemmer where everything they sell they claim is the best and they give a lifetime guarantee. They of course do not provide the manufacturer's name, but it is a light green color. Reminds me of the old Herters of days gone by. I like it because it uses traditional nozzles and wands. It does tend to leak a bit where you attach the garden hose, but I can live with that. I use it sometimes indoors where gasoline exhaust is a bit of a problem as well as in basements and crawl spaces.

I would suggest you use a long handled brush also such as you might use of 18 wheelers. Makes the job easier. A good detergent is useful and I tend to use Simple Green for most everything. You might try working from a ladder to keep the stuff from running down the handle and of course wear disposable gloves. The brush loosens things up rather than just powering it off with the pressure washer. Blowing stuff off with a pressure washer is time consuming.

You will want a degreaser type detergent. I have used this Sunjoe pressure washer on 5-6 jobs so far with no problems. That's often using it for hours at a time. If there is algae ("moss") on the siding, spraying down with chlorox solution and letting it set for about 30 minutes should kill that before you spray it off. But be careful with chlorox as it will kill grass and certainly hurt trees and shrubs.
 
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I bought my pressure washer from Costco. It cost $300 I think. When we had our pool redone the guy gave me $100 credit if I pressure washed the deck myself so I went to Costco and bought one. It comes in handy for many things. I even put on the widest spray tip and use it to wash my car.

Chad
 
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