Patrick at HMSGA

I load everything I use in the back of an 8' pickemup truck bed. Found a bunch of those square molded plastic boxes/cases, the ones that dairies use to carry 4 gallon bottles of dairy product in. I can set them in the truck bed, 2 or 3 rows of 4 cases, then cut a 2x4 the width of the truck bed, fit it against bed and molded wheelwell of bedliner (so it kinda locks into a position) and nothing slides anywhere or comes out of boxes if they were packed correctly. When 2x4 gets old and weathered, get a new one and use the old one for display and samples of cleaned and stained wood. There are enough cases to carry everything, they will each hold a 5g (full or empty), or 4 single gallons, can be straight stuff, pre-mixed, one has all kinds of brushes, one with pistol grip spray bottles, another one has oils and lubricants, another misc stuff, whatever I need to carry, and NOTHING slides around in the truck at all. I have a cover that fits over to help protect from weather and etc. I can carry all my other stuff, equipment, machines, hoses, lances, in back half of the truck bed. Everything fits, everything easy to find and get to, nothing slides around. When I need the truck for something else it unloads SO easily, either 4, 8, or 12 cases rather than dozens of bottles and brushes and buckets and all kinds of other stufff. When I reload truck everything goes right back to where it was so my stuff is always easy to find.

Once you get over the amount of money they cost, I don't think that they make a ladder any better than what Little Giant offers...

For the money, the one that Ken has is a really really good deal, and at that price if it only lasts you a couple of years you can trash it and get another one. I haven't had any of the trouble these other guys mention with my little Waner Control Spray, but it does get heavy, so I only use it for quickie stuff. Still for the diff in $$ I would buy what Ken offers instead of the Control Spray. HVLP gun and turbine is really the best way to go imho, gun and compressor is a close second, but with gun and compressor you will have issues with filtration, getting minute amounts of oil in what you are spraying, cooling issues for the oil and compressor, etc. You mention the air hissing all the time - that is called a "bleeder" gun. Okay once you get used to it, but you will like a "non bleeder" guns so much better. Here is the same gun I use with my compressor (since you already said that you have a compressor) and it does an extremely nice job for what I do with it. http://www.gleempaint.com/hvcongunnew.html Happy spraying!

Phosphoric Acid D'Limonene The "Love", good ole' Clorox works best for me...

Ken, I agree with you. I guess I am sorta sounding like an unpaid shill for you, but the sprayer you sell will do a surprisingly nice job for the kinds of work we do, especially for the price of that sprayer you are selling. People just don't realize it until they have tried one. I normally use a conversion gun and compressor for HVLP, but my primary turbine sprayer is a Wagner 2900. The one you sell is a much less expensive, but very similiar version to that type unit. I have had mine for several years with no trouble at all from it. There is a better gun available as kind of an upgrade if I am not mistaken, the same gun used on more expensive sprayers. Sure you can spend a lot more for a Graco, Titan or DevilBliss (and they are all high quality equipment), but for the money you spend to apply sealant to a deck or fence I just don't see the point in spending so much more hard earned cash on more expensive equipment. Maybe to clearcoat a Mercedes, yeah, but we are talking about decks and fences... I have used both types, and the time spent using either one, and looking at the final result, for the extra money the more expensive ones cost I would go with something like these almost every time. It's just a deck or fence we are doing most of the time, and most of your competition will use quicker means, even to use a pump-up sprayer. I even saw one guy applying some el-cheapo stain with a mop and a rag not long ago. If we use a quality sealer like ready seal, applied with HVLP (I even prefer it to a deckster) you are going to get noticeably better quality of work than your competition, while you can maximize profits by not spending so much $$ on equipment. The original post said he already has a compressor, and he can get a nice conversion spray guy for somewhere around $100.00 Sorry to butt in, but I guess I tend to be one of those who tries to be as practical and economical (yeah, maybe sometimes even cheap) as I can in how I spend my $$ to buy what I need to do my job. One sure way I know of to maximize profits is to control equipment costs.

I have had and used expensive turbine HVLP's like Graco and DevilBliss, costing on up into the $1,000 price range, and they do a very nice job, but for the kind of exterior work we are doing I use a Wagner (non-bleeder) conversion gun (I think I paid just a little over $100 for it), run off a little 2hp 6 gallon pancake compressor, and it does just fine for what I need it for. Should work for the kinds of clear coat material you are spraying on your doors. You don't always have to spend a ton of money for equipment you don't plan on using often, or you need or plan to heavily depend on it. Heck, for some kinds of work I do on decks, fences and outdoor furniture I have one of those very inexpensive little Wagner "Control Spray" thingies and as long as I am careful using it I have always been happy with the results I got, saving time to set up more complicated equipment for doing small jobs and touch up work. The materials you use, how you prep to do the work, and the operator of the sprayer are as big a part of what you are doing as the equipment you will be using. Not long ago I had customers, some older folks who just didn't have so much $$, and their kitchen cabinets were old and dirty from 40 years of getting not much at all done to/for them. They couldn't afford expensive refinishing work, so we took the doors off and drawers out, cleaned the wood, cleaned and refinished the hardware (couldn't really even afford new hw) and sprayed clearcoat (used clear only, didn't even use any stain) on all the surfaces, and the result really turned out nice for a LOT less than the $2,500 and up other people were quoting them to refinish their cabinets. Go for it, your doors oughta look really nice when you are done.

...but pressure washing is so EASY! Isn't that what they say? Any d-it-y'er will tell you that, until it takes him 8 hours to clean his driveway when we can do the driveway AND the walk in 2 or less. I used to use 12%, but went back to using Clorox, dulited at about two gallons (maybe 3) in 5. Takes a little longer, but for me nothing else in the 6% seems to work as well, and have never killed or even damaged anything green as far as I know. I breathe better, and that means a lot to me.

I have also used the Prosoco oil stain remover. You mix it into a poultice, leave it overnight, and clean it up the next morning. Dominion Restoration has some good stuff called DR-60 (Sodium Hydroxide based, if I remember correctly), their website is - www.domrest.com I think that Delco might also carry DR-60, at least they did at one time. Haven't tried it yet, but I have heard some VERY good things about something called "Pour-n-Restore". www.pour-n-restore.com V-seal also carries some good stuff, and also for places where recovery is an issue when you need to clean V-Seal has a waterless concrete cleaner. their website address - www.vseal.com 1-877-73V-SEAL (877-738-7325) ask for Keith (a good guy) There just aren't any better concrete sealants (or better people) in our entire industry than V-Seal products, imho, I won't even use anything else.

I see this old post without apparent closure. Do you still need advice or have you already finished this?

The broken glass left him an opening to make a claim against you, where he should have been thinking himself lucky you didn't cut yourself where you could have had a claim against him...lol

To Jeff: WOW! WHAT A POST, really makes one think. So many times, what we see as big things are actually insignificant, and some of those little things that we nearly overlook may turn out to be the most important of all. To all: If we have our health and a close family, like I have, there is plenty to be thankful for. Anything else just makes it better. For those of us who own/operate our own businesses, we have the opportunity (equal to anyone else) to make it whatever we want it to be for the time and effort we are willing to put into it. Very little that is really worthwhile seems to come easy, at least to me... For me, this is a very special time of year culminating in a celebration of the Anniversary of what I believe to be the most significant event in the history of mankind. Let's not forget what Christmas is REALLY all about! Gift giving is nice for those who can do it, and not all can. Nothing would mean more to someone than our spending some of our precious time with them. Time is something we all have, and it is one of the most precious gifts of all that we can give to someone else. Take a minute to think about those we might not be near next year as situations change and people move on, or those who might not even be here next year because of their age or health, or ours. We can give them a material gift that they will soon forget, but what about spending some of our priceless time with them, doing something together with them that they like to do, maybe buy something together that will make them (or you) think of that time together in years to come. The reason I say this is that during the Holiday Season of 1986 I decided to begin doing this. I spent a lot of time with my Dad, and he passed in July 1987, but in 1986 I never knew I would never have another Holiday Season with him. I still remember the time we had together, and still have the photographs taken of him then. Gifts given by either of us to the other would have been long gone and forgotten, but I will always remember spending that time with him... Here's to a Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, and even if it is not politically correct to say so, let me be one of the first to also wish all of you a - Merry Christmas !!!

their wood surfaces? Here are some before and after photo's of some of the work I have done recently, work that I am proud of having done... Photo's on my pc were the wrong size, so I copied them into the gallery, here is the link (also, the second pair are out of sequence, but you get the point) - http://www.thegrimescene.com/gallery/browseimages.php?s=&do=member&catid=&imageuser=2444&searchid=&orderby=dateline&direction=ASC&cutoffdate=-1

If your hotbox is rated for enough pressure and flow (need some fudge factor, so maybe a little above that to be safe) you will get when combining two machines you should be okay if you set it up correctly. Combining two machines will produce the flow of the two machines added together, but the pressure will stay about the same, or no more than the highest rated machine, say if one is rated at 3,500 psi and the other at 4,000 psi. Don't get too much different pressure between the two machines you are combining. Another well known and reputable Company (don't know if I can use their name here ???) sells the hardware and plumbing you would need, it is primarily designed to feed one flat-surface machine from two pressure washers. Set the plumbing up to join the hoses close to the pumps so you only have one pressure line to deal with. You need to have the same kind of unloader (flow regulated) on both pw pumps, and having them bypassed back to your fresh water holding tank really helps a lot. It takes some tweaking and a little getting used to but it really helps in cases where you need more cleaning power to do a larger area or get better cleaning and rinsing or to do it more quickly. Also make sure your flat surface cleaner is sturdy enough, using the right tips that are aimed properly. Just make sure that the concrete surface you are cleaning is (cured for long enough and) hard enough to withstand what you are doing without getting all marked up, which is much easier to do than to correct. Let the chemical do the cleaning work, and use the machine to finish up what the chemical started doing. Some will say why not just get a more powerful machine, but I say that unless you need and use it often enough to justify doing that, this works just fine as an alternative for those time when it is a viable alternative. I do the above off two hotboxes, but have also done it off of one. You say you have two so you should be fine if you are reasonably careful. I do this often, and it works for me. I made another recent post explaning how I have downsized, and no longer even own any hot water skid machines (sold them), so all I have are cold water units, but they can also be hot water machines when I need that. Sorry, too many "I's". Good luck!

Congratulations on having something that many around here don't have - Just keep this in mind... When you use your equipment to do Soda blasting, it will REALLY do a good job cleaning almost anything, just be very careful WHERE you use it. The wash water will at least brown almost anything it touches in the surrounding landscaping. I KNOW what they say about it being safe to use and environmentally friendly, but I also know what I saw firsthand... I know a guy (a DIY'er) who bought a "Wadu" off eBay last Summer and went KRAZY with it. He cleaned everything in sight, equipment, tools, walks, playsets, everything he could find to clean.. Next morning when he went outside, most of the grass and landscaping around his property was browned, and it still hasn't fully recovered. Baking Soda is a great media to use to clean. Great stuff, just wanted to warn you ahead of time to look for wide open spaces to use it... Good Luck! I am also in Metro Atlanta, give me a call or shoot me an email sometime...