PressurePros

Tim, I would think long and hard about it. A few hours in the morning to do estimates, paperwork, and jobs? I am assuming you have no experience so that means you will be rushing through jobs and making a ton of mistakes that could cost you above and beyond your initial business investment.

For future reference it would probably serve you better to strip any accessories like trellises, planter boxes etc before you strip the floor. Not a big deal though. If it's feasible I would wet the deck first before applying stripper to arbor, then immidiately rinse again to prevent furring. After final rinse hit everything with the acid.

Garage floors are where a surface cleaner with vac recovery pay for themselves.

That's right, I had forgotten that you are in the pool business, Mark.

The whole thing ran a little over projected time at almost 40 hours. If you are going to hand rub anything it should be the rails IMO. Cut's your prep time way down and avoids you having to approach spindles from ten different spray angles. On the floor, you have to worry about hitting between the boards. With a rag this is very difficult. I have found some thick nap lambswool pads at Ace that have worked well with floors. It gets down between the boards nicely. On a standard job, I use an HVLP spray gun attached to my compressor. It's slower than an airless but you use less material and you get less overspray.

Mark, maybe you can talk them into keeping the pool covered. It is going to wash into it. Thats a tough job, that grass is immaculate. I would jst try to keep it soaked with water while I was stripping. You will probably brown the edges. Be up front with the people. You might want to consider EFC-38 and maybe applying the same sealer? Is that Cabot's on there now?

60-80 grit depending upon the species.

No problem, Glock. At least you are here trying to learn the right way.. A couple of guys on here say it best when they say "Homeonwer products gets you homeowner results" You need to get some HD-80, F-18, or other contractor strength wood stripping chemicals. Can't get those at Home Depot unfortunately.

Jon, I have tried sodium hydroxide on wood. In fairness, and for comparison sake, I used Delco's hottest formula that I used on hoods for awhile. The results were lousy. It is entirely possible that Delco's hood cleaner still wasn't the percentage of NaOH I needed. I have been averaging 40 lbs of HD-80 per week so I am all for achieving the savings of which you speak. I am an economics guy not a chemist so yes, to an extent I have to rely on those more knowlegable than I when it comes to percentages of chemical and their ratios in a final product. I am also guilty of buying Windex and I suppose believing the hype that through some magic R&D they have come along with a better formulation than plain ole water and vinegar. For me, it comes down to convenience and customer service. I make one call and four days later my chemicals for the next week are at my doorstep. When I have a question on use, yes, another call usually solves the problem. I realize that customer service costs money. When I want the cheapest push broom I go to Walmart. When I want a more durable broom, that will serve my needs and have a knowlegable person to educate me on the intracies of broomology, I pay the extra. I will revisit my opinions on using HD-80, F-18 or any product if making them in raw form is as easy as you state. For now I just don't have the time to play around. How did you come acrossed these ratios and mixes?

If you break down the cost and time saving with 80 or F-18, it really is well worth it. Pure hot sodium hydroxide is not only bad for the wood, it's not a great stripper. Time is money and I am not into spending hours of my time trial and error finding the right combination of chemicals that will strip one year old Behr sealer. On most strip jobs I use 8 oz of HD-80 per gallon. The final cost is about $6/gallon. With rewetting I get about 80 sq ft per gallon. On a 20x20 with rails and a couple of steps, I use about 10 gallons or $60. I would get $600 for this portion of a restoration. Factoring in 5 hours to do a thorough job stripping, rinsing and brightening and adding another $25 for acid, I make my hundred per hour. Adding even one hour to my overall time by using an inferior chemical combination would not be worth saving pennies on raw chemicals. Sometimes it is much wiser to look at the big picture instead of getting hung up on apples to oranges comparisons. Just my $.02

Thanks! I have about five more that size waiting to be sealed.

Is that thing even up to code? What did you use to clean, it came out nice for you.

Here is an email I recieved this morning. I really need to refer her to someone in the NYC area. She is about one mile north of the city. I would have to charge her a ridiculous rate to get out there as it is at least a three hour ride for me. There is also concrete work that needs to eb done and a housewash in this package. Sounds like she is willing to spend the money. Okay, Ken, I'm pretty convinced that you're the man we need. Our job isn't huge. We have a wood ceiling on our covered porch that has gotten some mold due to poor ventilation. We have fixed the ventilation problem. Our painters came in and started sanding at the wood, but it's really not hitting the mark. The wood on the railing of our front porch needs help, too. I've had a really bad experience so far with our hardwoods inside. We ended up having to hire another company in to do the job after the first company did a number on our floors. I really like this wood ceiling on the porch and know it could be brought back to life if handled correctly. What's the wait time after cleaning before it can be sealed? I realize we'd be talking 6 hours of drive time for a small job, but how much would we be looking at? Our deck is approx. 50 feet long and 10 feet wide. I'm going to have a new Mahogany deck put down within the next two weeks. Wondering if we could time this s! o you could stain/seal that, as well. I'd pay hotel for you to stay overnight. Let me know what we'd be looking at. If this is totally unrealistic, please let me know if you know someone really good in the area. Money isn't falling from our trees, but I just can't stomache having my porch screwed up after what happened to the inside of our house. Thanks, Sandi

Mark, I'm still waiting to hear from a guy in NY. I'd really rather pass this off, but I am picky to whom I hand over referrals so I need to see some of this guy's work. I'll probably end up giving you a call on Monday morning, have a great weekend. -Ken

I took on a deck job and committed mortal sin. I did not do a test, just jumped right into the strip. The deck had one year old Cabot's decking stain on top of Thompson's done a year prior to that..all homeowner applied. The sealer was failed miserably with worn spots, mold, you name it. In other spots it looked like they just kept "painting" over it to cover drips, runs and spots. What a nightmare. HD at 4 oz was like applying dish soap. Took it to full strength 20 minute dwell. Some of it came off. Reapplied at 10 oz/gal and let dwell 40 minutes. This time 98% of it came off when I used 800 psi. Needless to say, I can knit a sweater with what dried on the surface of the spindles. There is plenty of money in the job so I am not sweating the defurring, but could I have taken a better route? Would this have been a time to have Boost on hand?

An MSDS does not supply enough information to replicate a chemical formulation.

It is my understanding that HD-80 is not just Sodium Hydroxide with a cheap soap. Speaking with Russ several times he actually gave me a bit more of a breakdown of the actual components in HD-80. I try to remain unbiased and I'm sure f-18 is an outstanding product, but I think bashing one product over another when 1) The statements made are based upon rhetoric not science and 2) Real world results are varied and dependant upon the person performing the comparison

The side that wraps around the house

Full view

This is what happen when homeowners over apply a penetrating oil Stripped This is the part that wraps around the wall. The people moved their chairs back onto this part of the deck before it was fully cured and scratched the surface.

Mark sounds win/win. I will give you a call Friday afternoon. My biggest issues are the gas, wear and tear on truck and bringing labor. Your suggestion could feasibly work out and I won't have to charge her as much and still put a nice profit in your pocket. It would also solve a labor for learning circumstance. There are a couple of things in the making so whichever pans out. Thank you for the offer. PS: How far are you from Monmouth County.

Awesome, Celeste.

Was this stuff posted months ago and just showing up now? I just got back from buying shorts and a new pair of sunglasses. Who cares about X-mas trees this time of year?

The township is called Mahopac. Job is described as deck, housewash, walkways and pool area. Send me a message and I will give you HO name and cell number

When I am not using an HVLP sprayer (which is too often) I use lambskin pads too. If they are the same ones I use they are excellent for eveness of sealer distribution and they get down into the cracks and they don't drip like crazy. Thye are about ten bucks and screw onto the end of an extension pole. Bummer is I can't find replacement pads and have to buy the whole thing over and over