by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School December

Pressure Washing School December

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Washing School December, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School September

Pressure Washing School September

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Washing School September, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School August

Pressure Washing School August

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Cleaning School, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School July

Pressure Washing School July

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Washing School July, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

 

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School June

Pressure Washing School June

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Washing School June, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Pressure Washing School April

Pressure Washing School April

Learn how to start and operate a Pressure Washing and Soft Washing business. Invest 1-1/2 days at school with Doug Rucker. You’ll gain practical, hands-on and classroom training and benefit from Doug’s years of experience as a pressure washing contractor! You will significantly shorten your learning curve. Register for The Pressure Washing School, located in the Houston, Texas, area, and owned by Doug Rucker. Doug owns PowerWash.Net, a Kingwood, Texas-based Pressure Washing Company.

Any questions please call or text 281.883.3630 use our Contact Form

Feel free to check out my You Tube Channel.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Figuring Downstream Bleach Dilutions

Figuring Downstream Bleach Dilutions

I am often asked about figuring downstream bleach dilutions when pressure washing.  I have never really cared to know what the exact precise percentage of bleach to water is coming out of my gun.  What I am concerned with, is one important fact, is the bleach mix strong enough to change the color of the organic stains or not.   If it isn’t then I know I need to use my dedicated pump, like our Kingslinger Soft Wash System, or a pump up sprayer.  Always remember, that all a Soft Wash System is, is a pump up sprayer on steroids.  It allows you to get a stronger mix, like with a pump up sprayer, without having to re-fill the canister and continuously have to manually pump air into the sprayer.

STRONGEST MIX

The strongest bleach solution you can usually achieve using a General Pump Downstream Injector is around .8-10%.  If you have green algae which is easy to remove, then downstreaming will work for that. Once you get in to the darker and black mildew stains, then you need a stronger mix than downstreaming can deliver.  A pump up sprayer or soft wash system that can get you 20% or higher, is great for that.  For Roof Cleaning, you definitely need stronger mix ratios then what downstreaming can deliver.

If you are one that likes figuring downstream bleach dilutions, then here is a bucket method test you can perform. Also be sure to check out my Online Pressure Washing Video School if you are starting a pressure washing business.

How to manually figure out your dilution ratio on your pressure washer.

Step 1:

Check your flow rate on your pressure washer for 1 minute to see how many GPM your pressure washer is putting out. Use a container that measures gallons along the side of it and fill the container up for 1 minute and try to make sure to not allow any water to get out of the container as you are doing this test. (Ideally you will want to do this test with your rinse tip on the end of your wand)

If your container doesn’t have the markings, or a graduated scale, then you can manually mark them by using a measuring a cup to pour desired amounts into the container, and then mark them.

Step 2:

Test your upstream or downstream injector by getting a metering jug that measures ounces and fill it with water and put your soap line into the metering jug and draw the water for 1 minute. This will allow you to see how many ounces your soap injector is drawing in a minute.

Step 3: 

Doing a little math

For example:

If you have a 5 GPM pressure washer then you will do the following math to figure out your dilution ratio on your pressure washer.

5 X 128 (128 ounces in 1 gallon)=640 ounces

Draw rate in a minute: 40 ounces

640/40= 16 total parts, 15 parts water to 1 part chemical, so your dilution ratio would be 15:1 or some in the industry will say 1:15.

I am also including a link to a calculator that you can play around with, and may help you as well.

https://jansson.us/mixingratio-concentration.html#pressureWasherCalculator

Figuring Downstream Bleach Dilutions

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Five Roof Cleaning Tips

FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS

This FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS post is helpful for anyone providing professional roof cleaning service.  If you are new to the pressure washing industry, you may not be able to provide roof cleaning service at the start.  But as you grow your business, you can purchase equipment and expand the services you offer.  Roof cleaning is certainly a great service to add for any pressure washing business.  I hope these FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS help you decide if this service is right for your company.

MOSS AND LICHEN

Setting customer expectations is the first of my FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS when dealing with moss and lichen.  It’s important that the customer understands that moss and lichen will not be removed from the roof.  It will change color and usually turns white.  We explain that the mix we use will kill the moss and lichen, which is why it turns white.  With wind and rainfall over time, it will eventually loosen from the tiles but we never discuss a specific time frame.  We suggest explaining that it didn’t get there over night, so it won’t go away over night either.  Using pressure to attempt to remove moss and lichen from the roof will only do more damage to the integrity of the roof.

SPRAYING TECHNIQUE

The second of the FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS is DO NOT FLOOD THE ROOF!  The shingles just need to be wet but when water runs off, you’re simply wasting product and could possibly harm plant life below.  We use our 10 Gallon Per Minute Kingslinger soft wash system with a 2 Gallon Per Minute tip. This helps me control and preserve solution.

REMAINING TIPS

For the full details of the remaining FIVE ROOF CLEANING TIPS, be sure and watch the entire video.  We demonstrate use of Tyvek House Wrap from Lowe’s to assist with property protection.  Wetting plants before, during, and after the project is important to protecting the plant life from any degree of damage.  I also explain the use of guns versus using a ball valve.  If this post has been helpful, here is another one you might be interested in.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Ball Valve Installation

BALL VALVE INSTALLATION

All of our trucks and trailers now have a ball valve installation that we recommend.  It is a three way valve that allows us to make a switch.  We can switch from the tank fill to a garden hose quickly and easily.  Some of examples for using this include filling a bucket, or the need for a high wash station.  If we need light pressure for anything like rinsing off the truck or anything else, it’s much easier than using a drain hose.

HOW BALL VALVE INSTALLATION WORKS

Water arrives to our rigs through the garden hose reel.  It then flows directly into the ball valve.  It can easily switch from filling the tank to a rig mounted garden hose.  With several different nozzles, you are able to use it in different ways.  For example, we have a fireman’s nozzle that can be purchased from Home Depot or Lowe’s.  This nozzle provides a wide range or garden hose pressure from a pretty long, straight stream to nothing more than a trickle if needed.  It’s ideal for filling a soap bucket without creating a lot of splashing suds.  In addition, we have a second nozzle that provides stronger pressure and a longer stream.  It’s the same nozzle that we use for just rinsing houses using a dedicated pump.

TRAILER VIEW

In this video, we also provide a quick view of the entire trailer.  I have been testing a booster pump, but eventually concluded it’s not really worth using.  I was not impressed at all!  So if you have any questions about this ball valve installation, just shoot me an email and I’ll answer as quickly as I’m able.  Be sure and subscribe to our YOUTUBE CHANNEL for more helpful videos.  Perhaps you would enjoy another post about a newer pressure washing truck rig.

by Doug Rucker Doug Rucker

Downstream Injector Check Valve

Downstream Injector Check Valve

For about the last eight months to a year I have been using a Downstream Injector Check Valve for Soft Washing. These not only help the injectors last longer, since we are removing the ball and spring, but they also actually make the mix a little stronger. We have been able to clean some porous surfaces that have the black algae stains on them, a little faster than using the injectors how they come. They are available on my store HERE .

Very easy to install, you simply remove the hose barb from the Downstream Injector.  Then you remove the ball and spring, which will pop out anyway. Attache the check valve where the hose barb was, and you are ready to attach your hose and start downstreaming.

Downstream-Injector-Check-valve

For the last few years there has has been a lot of mis-information about what soft washing is and isn’t.  As long as y9u are using low pressure to apply your chemical mix, and rinsing under low pressure, you are Soft Washing.  The use of a dedicated pump does not dictate that you are soft washing.   Downstreaming is the original soft wash method that I was taught to use way back in 1979.

While a dedicated pump will allow you to apply a stronger mix than downstreaming,  just like a pump up sprayer will.  In fact, thats all a dedicated pump is, a pump up sprayer on steroids.  If you want to clean buildings and houses faster, then using a downstream injector check valve is the way to go.  Your mix will be much stronger than a traditional injector.

I always encourage people starting a pressure washing business, to learn how to downstream first. This will help you learn to clean in a traditional way, and help prevent damage to landscape.

For more educational options, be sure to check out our online video school.  You can also check our class schedule page.