plainpainter

Do you mean for the customer - or for my own records? I am just setting up an excell spreadsheet - and just programming in formulas - there is plenty of built in statistics. To be honest - I didn't real sell that well today, other than verbally explaining about the tiger stripes - and how most guys 'kill' trex with too hot of bleach mix - and kill the color. I didn't have any good pamphlets - oh well season is early - it will be a few weeks before I have my $hit together.

When I was trained to use Diedrich paint stripping products on homes to remove 8+ layers of paint - after a 24 hour dwell period, instead of using 1000psi to remove the paint with a pressure washer - we were first taught to use their oxalic acid product and distribute over the entire home all over the stripper, to neutralize before rinsing. Would this make sense in deck stripping at all? perhaps a large deck - where you want the 'stripping' action to cease in certain spots - so allowing you more time to rinse off other parts of a deck. I know this had something to do with occupation safety - and you didn't want 'caustics' being forced into the pores of the wood when using the pressure washer. Of coure a second application of acid was applied to the bare wood - after all the paint was removed.

How is the 'Brass' city these days Jim? From what I remember - Diedrich wanted to 'neutralize' the stripper before we pressure washed it off - basically stop it's stripping action - and any solution going into the ground is just neutralized 'salts'. So no effect on the environment - I thought that was how they stayed within osha regulations as biodegradable.

Ken - what happened to the 'you shouldn't be winning more than 35% of your estimates' philosopy?

I don't understand why the epa doesn't let coatings manufacturers use turpentine? It's not affected by oil industry - and turpentine is being exhausted into the atmosphere wether we use it in a store bought product or not - so it's use has a net zero impact on the quality of air.

Diamond Jim - I have thought alot about decking stains - and I am afraid Russell is correct. You can have maintenance of product - or you can have durability, but you can't have both. RS being a perfect example, it's the easist to maintain in one sense - but has absolutely no durability - I suspect I will be flooding my ptp deck with RS/timberoil twice a year. But it does look pretty!

I don't know the epa law too well - supposedly I live in the 'reduced' emissions corridor of the northeast I believe with a limit of 350ml/liter of VOC's? Yet California paints which is a company in my home town blows by that with a decking stain that is 600ml/L VOC's - I posted pics of it on this website - and they are compliant! I think you can choose to take your products to the EPA on an individual basis and prove they don't affect the quality of air - and the EPA hands out 'exemptions'. I think lesser informed - lesser sophisticated companies don't do this.

Jim, in all fairness to Russell - he did raise the bar in terms of deck staining products. I know you guys have gone over to the parafinnic side - but for the most part deck stains started out decades ago by formulations of linseed oils and fungicides - which are curing type stains. That being said - without woodtux - what would guys be using now? ATO? Sikkens? What product out there has really done so much to prop up how well respected deck refinishers are considered? Beth and Rod for instance made a career on the woodtux products. I understand there has been the other side in terms of consistency of product - reformulations that have lead to minor disasters - and unreliable shipping. Russell assured me that after spring '07 that the formula has been 'locked' - he is no longer going to fool around with it - he is sticking to his guns, that if guys want an easier product - then there is the woodrich stain&seal product. And the woodtux will remain the slightly harder to use higher solids product. It's not easy to formulate a quality product, in all fairness products like readyseal are very easy and cheap to formulate. Parafinnic stains are very 'low' technology stains - I still see oil leaching after rainstorms on my deck 5 months after the last application. They definitely are not the end-all be-all to high quality deck restorations. Heck - I have this section of roof that pours onto my deck - which doesn't have a rain gutter - and you can see a clear line of demarcation in the deck, where the oils have been washed out! Its not pretty and isn't very professional looking in my opinion.

I use 40 grit most of the time - I think of 80 grit as 'fine' sanding for exterior.

To be honest - I haven't been tracking the whole amen saga - only just barely know that there is one. So what's up with Amen - how can anybody **** off more people than me?

I think the real issue, Beth, with applying woodtux on wet vs. dry wood - is that it is much harder to guage how much actual product has actually gone on the wood when applied to wet wood. I think there is the natural tendency to 'under' apply perhaps? But this is stretching it anyways - as you say, you can't sand wet wood! And I agree totally.

If you won't stain wood at 17% vs. 15% - you are really splitting fine hairs, even for a traditional product that needs dry wood. I've always said 18% I think is fine - I don't even think wood in a humid environment truly can ever dry much more than 15-16% anyways.

Man that was a really nice job/comeback - Rick what's your rate per sq.ft. on a deck like that?

I disagree with you on the wet sponge theory, Beth. Woodtux is relying on the molecular weight of the resin to displace the water. I have applied woodtux directly over a deck I had washed and neutralized last May - if anything the brush dragged - but it allowed me to get a very even finish. I have in the past used oil primers on wet wood, and with one particular product - an hour later there was a puddle of water sitting on top of the primer - it had forced the water out of the wood! So the wet sponge analogy doesn't always hold.

That guy is just a jerk for never trying to protect that wood. How hard is it to hose it off each year and dump cuprinol all over it, sure not pretty - but at least it would have been in restorable condition.

I use to trade 'Euro' Dollars on the exchanges.

I did a deck a year ago this coming May - it was '06 formula wtw warm honey gold - the deck was a year old - that I used a bleach/TSP/surfactant formula through a downstreamer - barely strong enough to kill mold with lots of scrubbing - then neutralized with 9 0zs per gallon of oxalic acid - too white in retrospect. But the condition of that deck when I go to tak a look at in the next few weeks will dictate whether I continue with woodtux or not. If I am going to start paying $55/gallon of deck stain - it better be tough as nails and look close to perfect on horizontals after 2 years - otherwise, why not just go with something better priced and sell yearly service. like a parafinnic or bakers' which is pretty. If it ain't gonna last - then I am going with 'pretty' for a reasonable price.

Well, Russell has raised the price so much on his product, and if Scott doesn't keep the price down on his site - I will abandon woodtux on price. California storm stain, Muralo, Defy - are some of the things I will be experimenting with.

Beth - I don't doubt that percarbs by itself can do what you say it does. But then will a 'Raw' strongly mixed brew of percarb make the wood fuzz up real bad? I guess TSP mixed hot enough with enough scrubbing and applications can kill mildew - but by the time it does - the paint is gone as well. I use to mix up hydroxide to strip finishes - and was using up to 24ozs. per gallon - then I learned about surfactants - and have gotten that down to 3 ozs. to do the same job.

I think Rick - if you threw in pure percarbs into your laundry wash - would it really clean your clothes? Or does the addition of a detergent better help the washing? I think wood is no different - it needs to be washed as well. Caustics such TSP or Sodium Metasilicate are more detergent 'builders' in that they aid the detergency of your 'soap'. And as well - since they are elevated in ph - they help break apart old finishes.

Of, course he is still in Business, his customer told ten friends, and each one of those customers told ten friends. I expect in the last 3 years he's expanded to your area by now.

You know Rod - it never occured to me to let chems dry on the part of the deck that no longer needed dwell time. I think that's genius - as large decks are always frustrating

I don't know what hydroxide you guys are using - but hydroxide never touches really green algae growth. I've tried those hydroxide based house cleaners on vinyl siding - and didn't do a darn thing either. It works great for just greyed wood - but I haven't seen it do anything to any growth on the wood.

I read recently that UV sunlight destroys Hypochorous Acid A.K.A. Bleach. So you can leave a restored deck in sunlight a few more days and have it be neutralized by sunlight!

Have flun cleaning a super 'green' deck with just percarbs. I guess percarbs are the friendlier wood cleaner - but nothing kills like bleach - and on a neglected deck that is 7+ years old - you are taking off the top layer of wood anyways. Pool stores have an acid called Sodium Sulfate that neutralizes any bleach residue - and will 'brighten' the wood as well.