RyanH

I cleaned a few boats in my youth (grew up around Charleston, SC). We just used garden hoes (not hose and not "ho"s) and wire brushes. Repainted with a marine paint, but I'm thinking it was lead based back then. I didn't even know what a pressure washer was then. Damn it stunk!

Bleach is inneffective for mud and dirt. With the GA red clay, I've found greased lightning to work pretty on small-time applications (garage doors, vinyl at the 3 - 4 foot height, etc.). I played with different types of chemicals but found that the most effective way for me (on vinyl) was to spray the lightning, brush, then rinse. Very quick and effective. But for brick and stone, I've had fantastic success with Ken's suggestion: "Pure [water] is excellent for removing mud"

I had lots of fun in that area not too long ago. But holy crap, there are so many coffee houses and bistros splattered around that area its insane. Be prepared to fend off the homos and the homeless like flies folks!

Which is why drinking deionized or distilled water is a BAD idea.

One customer wanted me to pressure wash his house, clean his gutters, get the windows, etc. while having his house renovated. For goodness sakes, he was wanting me to blow the leaves out of his gutters while he was having the pool deck installed. This was the job from hell for sure. Stupid me (this was in the beginning) actually went to his house 5 times for different tasks. Twice I went and could do nothing because other contractors had the water lines disconnected for plumbing reroute! Needless to say I was a little ill with the situation. Then he almost fainted when I gave him the final bill. What bothered me more than anything was that the place looked like crap after I was done because of all the construction that was going on. The beautiful driveway had fresh mud tracks from the other contractors, dust all over the windows and siding from the concrete saws and dirt movers, this guy really had a very poor sense of planning.

I clean flatwork in my sandals with exposed toes. One can only take so much GA sun. Wouldn't cut grass exposed, though! I can control where that water goes.

This is like closing the barn door after the horse has wandered off, but this sounds like a good time to push a program like Norton Ghost or similar drive imaging software. Ghost saved my butt last week and saved me about 20 hours of wasted time. It makes an exact copy of your hard drive and compresses it to a file. You can back up from it in events such as this. Most likely, even restoring your system by reinstalling Windows or your peripheral software will not eradicate the cause of your problems. The buggier these new viruses and spyware get, the more often I am willing to just reformat and start all over. Having to do that several times has made me pursue the imaging and backup options I mentioned above.

Years ago I used something called Sulfuac to clean out clogs in drains. It was a liquid and I'm almost positive it was sulfuric acid. Sodium hydroxide worked okay, but it had nothing on the acid. Same precautions, though. It can actually get VERY hot in those pipes. I bought it at a janitorial supply store. They sold it with protective gloves and 6 pages of safety information. Haven't been able to find it in a few years, though. The store claimed they had too many complaints of people burning themselves. I always had this guy who would come in and crap while I was trying to clean the bathrooms. He didn't care that I was trying to get in and get out...I think he enjoyed pissing me off with it. Sooooo.....one day I'm cleaning the breakroom and I notice him beebopping along towards me on his way to the bathroom. A few good squirts of my drain opener in the bowl combined with some healthy splashes caused by his lack of consideration for my schedule, and he had some pretty good irritation going on for quite awhile. Hey, I warned them all........

You know, why don't we hear Michael Moore out there making a mocumentary of this stuff? I would love for him to confront politicians on their reasoning for allowing one person to obtain property from another by force.

is waitress tipping anything like cow tipping?

This roof could have really used a stronger concentration. It took 4 applications of 6% straight to remove the black stuff completely. (white roof pics) http://www.thegrimescene.com/forums/showpost.php?p=19799&postcount=2 I used 6% straight on this roof, but 3% may have been sufficient as one application was enough and it worked VERY quickly. (gray roof pics, pics 2 and 3 are of the same place on the roof, before and after) http://www.thegrimescene.com/forums/showpost.php?p=19801&postcount=4

excerpt.. "For the next five weeks or so under the supervision of the Alfred Karcher Company, park rangers will be seen hanging precariously from rope harnesses, employing hot water blasters and silicone sealant dispensers. " Is this the same Karcher as he who makes the $99 electric PW special at Target?

You could have a needle valve made unless they already exist to fit inline in your hose. They used to use these on old outboard motors (before carbeurators) to proportion the fuel/air mixture. You may could calibrate a dial to the draw ratio for a given machine flow rate. That way you can have an "infinite" range of proportioners with one device. make it from stainless steel so it won't corrode. If you want to do the leg work on patenting something like this, I have access to a 3d modeling program intended to design such things as well as a CFD (computational fluid dynamics) package that will calculate the pressure drop and show the flow characteristics through the design. I'll come up with the design, you find the company to make it and the attorney to file the patent work, and we both buy brand new Harleys! (seriously, if this hasn't already been done, I can have an optimized design within the next 2 weeks, so let me know)

Maybe this can help to clear up some confusion about how the Xjet works..... The xjet is nothing more than a fancy looking siphon. Anytime you have a fluid flowing it creates a low pressure area along the axis perpindicular to flow at the fluid surface. The Xjet takes advantage of this fluid property by mounting a tube perpindicular to the flow of the water. At the chemical side of the tube, the pressure is whatever atmospheric pressure happens to be. On the water side, the perssure is significantly lower due to the flowing water. Because of the pressure difference, the air/chemical will move towards the water side and get mixed in with the water and come out as your cleaner. The pressure difference and the orifice size of the chem inlet as well as the length of tubing, type of tubing, and viscosity of chemical all affect the draw. Because the pressure difference is directly related to the flow rate of the water in your line, it is the flowrate output of the machine that determines the ultimate ratio of the Xjet. Mike says 5.5 gpm will equate to a 1:2.2 draw on an unobstructed tube; that may very well be the case (haven't verified as such), but is only valid if there are no proportioners. The proportioner just decreased the orifice size and thus increases the resistance to flow (pressure drop) and the flow rate through the chem port decreases (thus decreasing the chem:water ratio). There is an equation relating these that makes it pretty easy to see (and predict) what happens with different size proportioners, but I don't want Phelps to suffer any more uneccessary eye strain from those wacky symbols :rolleyes2 . But alas, anyone who has used the Xjet for any period of time has pretty much figured out that its easier to just vary your unitial concentration and not fumble with the tiny proportioners, especially when they are covered in bleach when swapping them out, and that aint fun on fingers.

Tell him you'll do it on the next day it rains.

You have to ask yourself if she took your information everytime with the intention of hiring someone else or if she was wanting to price around. I've had customers who want to know all the ins and outs of what I do and take up an hour of my time and then finally get to the point of telling me that they are pricing around and will call me if I was the cheapest. Evangelists are a funny group. If Jesus practiced piety, why do televangelits need to wear lots of gold and have fancy cars? Personally, I'd prefer the guy (or girl if she's hot) with Jesus in his heart who speaks from life experiences to me at the coffee shop or airport.

Russ, Thanks for the concern. Fortunately we moved out just in time. The place where we normally park the cars was under several large limbs after the blow job of the year. That house is actually about 2 miles north of the Speedway. The worst we got at the new house was lots of mud washing away from the lot, but no big deal to us (just the cul-de-sac and driveways below us). Of course I let them know I would be happy to give them a quote to clean their flatwork. I just hope FL doesn't get it like they did last year.

Ah. Okeydokey. missed that word. I'll pass that on to a past customer. They wanted me to clean a copper [don't know what the name is, but its a small roof over a bay window] thing on their house.

If you are going to use muriatic acid you'd better come up with a way of neutralizing it quickly. Hydrochloric acid and copper aren't good bedfellows.

From a balance point of view, if you keep your tank full (or even 75% full) all of the time, I would position it so that 80-90% of the tank footprint is over the axle. Keep about 10% overhang towards the front of your trailer. Position your skid unit behind the tank. The idea is to keep your *center of gravity* directly above the axle. If your tank is slightly forward and your skid is behind, you keep enough weight on your tongue. Use the lever rule to give a more exact location. The equation (torque balance) works out to: F = [ Wu(La - .5*Du)/(8.4*Vt) ] + .5*Lt Where: F = Distance from the axle center to the front edge of your tank Wu = weight of your skid unit (550# here you said) La = Distance from your axle center to the back of your trailer Du = Depth of your skid unit Vt = how much water is in your tank (in gallons) Lt = the length of your water tank (as measured perpindicular to your axle) Keep all length measurements (F,La,Du,Lt) in the same units (inches, feet, mm, furlongs, etc.) Of course, this doesn't include the weight contribution of your other equipment, but it should give you a pretty close figure to use in setting up your trailer for optimal placement.

Nothing beats my Bose Wave Radio with Rachmaninov or Liszt tickling the ivories and a dark room. Better than any television program! Wife wouldn't agree, though.

It's amusing, Jon, that you've yet to address the twice-issued challenge of relinquishing your property for the benefit of others. I'm guessing that so long as government is forcing the issue you're fine with it, but you don't want the responsibility yourself. You may be a great person, but your views (or those expressed here) are an anathema of freedom and I can tell you that when my rights and my freedoms are seized against my will for the benefit of someone else, I stop giving a damn about the other person and they then become the object of my affection. Personally, I think too many Americans are too stupid to appreciate the benefits of my acheivements and are undeserving of my efforts. Those who know me know I help those who are in true need, but those who refuse to help themselves or, even worse, rely upon my efforts with the understanding that BECAUSE of my efforts they have no need to help themselves, are left in the cold. People want to know why "rich" people use loopholes in the law to help themselves? It's because they are tired of the tax on their mind. And domain seizure (whether land property seizure, fiscal rape, or regulations to no end) will be the catalyst for the withdrawal of the American spirit. --What luck for rulers that men don't think; Hitler --You can get more with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone; Capone

Well, I got my new piece of equipment hooked up...man, that 30" Steel Eagle really hauls now...no longer for sale :) However, with bigger equipment comes more complication. I don't want the water to be circulated through the pump in bypass mode, so I understand that it has to go somewhere else. It has a K7 unloader on it and in my testing I have a hose going from the unloader into a 20 gallon tank. I have my feed line coming from the same tank and the water source going into the tank. This arrangement works fine but obviously is flawed because I'm putting more water into the tank than I'm removing. I don't have the space (nor the desire) to pull around my big 300 gal. tank, so I'm wondering if there's a piece of equipment to help out here. What I'd like to have is a float valve that will stop the water flow once it reaches a certain level in the tank and resume it when the level drops. I can think of some complicated arrangement where a bouyant device raises and, with the help of a lever, closes over the hose inlet, but aything easier? Place to look at/ buy? Help appreciated. Thanks, Ryan

Jon F, Effectively what you are advocating is the approval of a lynch mob. Sure, the issues are fought in courts with attorneys and judges and elected officials ultimately sign the paper giving authorization. But those elected people are put there by voters. When an act such as this happens, the people are basically saying "we are poor, hungry, etc. and your land will serve a better purpose for us than it will for you. To hell with your rights and right to property, WE want it and are taking it from you." If the land really was valuable to a company, it can be purchased for the right amount. If the guy refuses to sell, then his perception of "fair market value" is not being met. It's the same issue with the so-called "price-gouging" that people claim occurs in devastated areas: demand overwhelms supply. If the people in your town wanted a walmart so badly, why didnt they get together and say "Hey, that guy may not sell his land but we all want a walmart here. We want jobs and more income to the area, so buy OUR land instead. We are willing to sell it to you." Just like the people who won't voluntarily give up money to charities and the poor, but will be in full support of the government forcing everyone to give money through taxes, I'm betting the people in your town loved the idea of Walmart moving in so long as they didn't have to move from THEIR land. So what if it affects just one old guy? Atleast they get their imported goods at a cheap price. And as for the comment of "a small percentage of his couple thousand acres...." You know what? That was HIS land to do with as he pleased. If he didn't want to sell it, then nobody should force him to. How about voluntarily sending me a small percentage of your income you'll earn over the next year? I'll give you 50 cents on the dollar for every dollar you send me and put the rest towards community improvement projects or the building of a new school. Isn't that what increased tax revenue supports anyway, community projects, schools, police, etc? Does that sound like a good deal? It's the exact same scenario only on a smaller scale, albeit one that touches a little closer to your heart (and wallet) and I doubt you'd like it nor voluntarily opt for it. The overall issue is that our governments exist to protect the liberties of the citizens. When the time comes when the needs (really desires) displace the rights of the individual, there is a serious problem. We are seeing this today and it will get worse in the very near future. It's a cultural phenomenon that exists within the people in this country and throughout the world. Personal responsibility is diminishing, it's becoming more acceptable to pass the responsibility to someone else and hope that someone else covers for your ineptitude, such as building a store to support local people at the cost of the individual. I don't know that I would have the guts to go out blazing if eminent domain claimed my property, but I will make damn sure that there is coverage there when they break down my door and drag me out of my own house, and people will see that the very government they seek for protection is no better than the fascist or communist rule we claim to denounce.

Any pictures of 2 or 3 year old stain on ipe? Anyone?