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Pressure washing for beginners
Pressure Washing surfaces on buildings, sheds, garages, driveways, walkways, deck or fences is not be a fairly easy activity. As the cost of material for building a deck or fence increases, professional pressure washing services never been so important for home owners. Trying to get it done on your own or utilizing rental equipment or consumer level pressure washers to complete the task it's only requesting issues. Safer and more cost effective way is to make use of the professional providers that are offered in lots. Properly trained personnel of the business will get the task completed in no time.
Power washing services in Aurora
But pressure washing can be still fun and rewarding for homeowners and DIY business professionals not specializing in power washing.
Residential properties which have concrete, stone or wooden surfaces on or surrounding of the property needs consistent cleaning to take care of its appear. Whether or not the structures are vinyl siding, brick, concrete, slab stones or wood, an expert cleaning service can do a thorough assessment in order to implement proper procedure. Pressure washing is used on concrete to remove mold, gum, dirt and oily stains. On wooden surfaces it is used to get rid of unwanted paint, stain, tans and to return the wood’s vibrant colour, on buildings to remove pollution, mildew, algea, graffiti and other unwanted discolouration.
What Pressure Washer to buy?
Pressure washers work by forcing a motor rotation, operating a pump to increase the pressure of water flowing through the attached hose. That motor can be powered by gasoline or by electricity.
Gas Pressure Washers
Gas-powered pressure washers use automotive gasoline to drive the motor, gas engines typically provide higher PSI (pounds of pressure per square inch) and GPM (gallons of water per minute) than the electric version. Higher power means they clean surfaces much more quickly. Professional Contractors usually use gas pressure washers to clean surfaces due to its power and unrestricted mobility.
Electric pressure washers
Electric pressure washers use electricity to drive the motor, smaller home units operate at 120V 15A home outlet circuit while more powerful, commercial or industrial pressure washers utilize 220V or even 380V. Electric pressure washers can be more convenient than their gas-powered peers in some circumstances.
What Size Pressure Washer to choose?
In order to choose a gas or electric pressure washer, you’ll need to make a decision about the size of the engine, size of your project and how often you wish to operate the unit.
Like any other engine-powered machine, the size of the engine determines the total power of the unit. A small engine will not be able to produce the PSI or GPM output of a larger engine. Generally speaking, pressure washer engines are categorized in four ways.
Light-Duty Pressure Washers - up to 2000 PSI
Medium-Duty Pressure Washers - up to 2800 PSI
Heavy-Duty Pressure Washers - up to 3300 PSI
Professional Pressure Washers. - above 3300 PSI
How to Pressure Wash
After getting familiar with different types of pressure washers and techniques, we can start to think about pressure washing tips and tricks. Pressure washing can be a messy job—and dangerous if it isn’t done correctly. It’s important to take the time to adequately prepare.
Pressure Washing Safety Tips:
Eye & Hearing Protection
Be sure to wear eye and hearing protection.
Use Both Hands
High pressure can get you off ballance. Until you gain confidence hold the wand securely with both hands so that it won’t fly out of your grip.
Don’t Get Too Close
Keep the spray tip away from the surface you’re cleaning to minimize the risk of damage. Newer use pressure washer to clean plants or clothing. Keep pressurized water always away from skin.
The Bottom Line
Pressure washing your property can be a very fulfilling task. Clean surfaces will be notices by anyone right away, your property will stand out in the neighbourhood.
On the other hand, you may decide that pressure washing is just too much time consuming, hard work and risky undertaking. And that’s okay! If you’d rather let someone else take care of the pressure washing, contact a professional specialist for help.
Contact the best Pressure Washing Contractor in the GTA
By contacting Como Maintenance Services, you are hiring the best pressure washing contractor in the GTA.
Pressure Washing Patio Stones
How to wash patio stones properly
Just like any other surface, pavers, interlocking or patio stones are also always susceptible to dirt. Especially in outdoor areas, it’s very common to see dust accumulation, and when it comes to pavers, it is natural that other types of unwanted “dirt” start to appear.
Weeds growing at the joints, mold, moss, they are just a few examples of unwanted presences on outdoor pavers.
One of the most common methods and probably the best way to do so of cleaning them is with a pressure washer. You just need to turn on the washer and go clean everything that stands in your path, right? No!
Although it seems easy, it’s important to remember that for every cleaning method, you must follow a series of guidelines to make sure you’re not damaging your pavers, especially when pressure washing
In most cases, to get pavers clean with a pressure washer it requires using a jet style tip. This amount of pressure will easily damage the surface. Using a fan tip typically will not damage, but likely won’t achieve the level of clean you’re after.
If you pressure wash your pavers correctly, it will help your property look good as new. However, don’t fret if you don’t want to handle cleaning pavers with a pressure washer on your own—it can be intimidating because you don’t want to ruin your patio and displace the pavers. Instead, rely on the experts who know how to pressure wash your pavers with care and efficiency
Instead of using hand held sprayer, consider using rotation cleaners
The surface or rotation cleaner has a spinning head within a contained unit, with rotating arms – similar to a lawnmower. The arms spin as a result of the high pressure of water, which creates a scrubbing action. The greatest advantage in using an industrial surface cleaner is that they eliminate the “zebra” striping, which is typical to cleaning done with regular wands.
When more power is needed, use a turbo rotary nozzle but with care
This special attachment or so called nozzle tip increases the psi substantially. It spins a zero degree spray, in a 4-8 inch circle, at over 3000 rotations per minute. The spinning water jet hits the surface from multiple angles, which quickly breaks down crust on dirt and grime.
How to clean motor oil stains of pavers
The same as grease stains, oil stains can be removed with Professional Grade Oil and Grease remover. Depending on how long the grease or oil has been present on the surface of the stones, it may require more than one use to remove the stain. With the oil sitting on the surface of the stones, it will penetrate deeper into the porous material. When using any oil stain remover products, it is always recommended to read carefully the manufacturer instructions and it would not hurt to read reviews on that particular product. After you make the decision on what product to use, don't just go ahead and treat your oil spots with the chemical, your patio stone might have a different reaction to the chemical solution other than stated in the description or review. You should always choose a small hidden section to try the product on, once you are sure of there outcome, you can used it on the more exposed spots.
Can you use pressure washer to remove oil stains?
Yes and No!
Motor oil and grease, brake down only at high temperatures, using a regular cold water pressure washer will not be able to remove oil and grease stains. Trying to do so will most likely cause damage to the pawer doe to the frustration of operator, if a stain does not go away as desired, many homeowners increase the pressure or go too close to the effected area, this should be avoided at all times. But, if regular pressure washer doesn't cut it, what will work? You might ask.
There is a great solution to the problem and to the question raised. Hot water pressure washing! Now, this is where homeowners need to call pressure washing professionals to to the job. Trying to find a vendor who rents hot water pressure washers is next to impossible, and buying one to remove driveway oil stains has no economical value. Hot water pressure washer cost between $4000 and $20000 CAD.
Pressure washing your driveway or walkway patio stones can be very rewarding task. It takes some time and effort to master the pressure washing techniques, but once this task is learned, it can be a fun DIY task. Should you feel that pressure washing is to much hassle, you can always contact local professional pressure washing contractor in Toronto in order to get the surfaces cleaned in safe and efficient manner.
