the quickest way to strip a deck

[perfect power wash 14]

Hey guys i was wondering what was the safest and quickest way to strip a deck. what products do some of you guys use and how do you apply it!! Thanks in advance!!!!!! Jared

[Scott Paul 164]

Down stream the sodium hydroxide is the quickest way to strip a deck. We average about 1 hour for a 400 foot deck to strip and brighten.

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

Moving your thread....wrong forum.

Welcome to TGS.

Beth :)

[dperrin 14]

Down stream the sodium hydroxide is the quickest way to strip a deck. We average about 1 hour for a 400 foot deck to strip and brighten.

I have been using HD-80 the last couple of times. Is there a cheaper form of SH that can be used? HD is a bit expensive.

[Celeste 341]

You know that saying....you get what you pay for? We have stripped some pretty fierce stuff with HD80. A cheaper imitation may cost less up front, but when you have to use twice as much, where's the savings?

My .02 :)

Celeste

[PressurePros 249]

You know that saying....you get what you pay for? We have stripped some pretty fierce stuff with HD80. A cheaper imitation may cost less up front, but when you have to use twice as much, where's the savings?

My .02 :)

Celeste

Ditto. Stick with what works. You get what you pay for. Scott may offer an alternative downstreamable stripper. I haven't tried it yet but it gets good reviews.

Also, HD-80 works as low as 3 oz per gallon on most jobs.

[dperrin 14]

Ditto. Stick with what works. You get what you pay for. Scott may offer an alternative downstreamable stripper. I haven't tried it yet but it gets good reviews.

Also, HD-80 works as low as 3 oz per gallon on most jobs.

I have been using the max amount on jobs requiring removal of stain. If you say 3 oz will work then I will cut my dosage down a bit and see how it goes. That should help.

The main reason I mentioned this at all is I have heard some guys buy a big bag of generic SH crystals and mix there own that way. I have heard it is much cheaper this way, although I dont have any numbers. Seems to me SH is SH. Its a chemical compound. Cant see there being much difference but the label. I guess its mostly a convienience thing.

[PressurePros 249]

HD-80 has sufactants, buffers and at least one one other caustic that work synergistically to remove a finish. There is no way you can compare straight sodium hydroxide. Been there, done that, wasted the time.

[dperrin 14]

HD-80 has sufactants, buffers and at least one one other caustic that work synergistically to remove a finish. There is no way you can compare straight sodium hydroxide. Been there, done that, wasted the time.

I am not one to re-invent the wheel. Guess I'll order another tub of HD. Thanks.

[PressurePros 249]

dp, it helps to look at your material cost per s/f and factor it into your billing. If you really want to speed things up and save yourself time, the largest expenditure of all, mix up four gallons of water with half a tub of HD-80 and downstream it. You should be able to strip 1200 s/f of wood with that. That brings your material cost to under three cents per s/f. Mark this portion of your material cost up to $.05 per s/f and you are good to go. You will save yourself an hour over the life of that bucket applying chemical by downstreaming.

Many guys get caught up in what they are paying for a package versus factoring actual usage cost. If you look at mineral oil products (Ready Seal, Timber Oil) which sell for around $110 per pail, you'll see that they are the most expensive products to put on a deck because you use twice as much as you would using other higher resin solid products. That's not to say they don't have their place or are bad products per se, it just means you have to factor your cost and markup accordingly.

[Curb Appeal 14]

If you really want to speed things up and save yourself time, the largest expenditure of all, mix up four gallons of water with half a tub of HD-80 and downstream it. You should be able to strip 1200 s/f of wood with that.

Ken, I'm interested in downstreaming my stripper too. Using your numbers, half a tub (5lb or 80oz) of HD-80 into 4 gal of water comes out to 20oz per gal. I was under the impression that HD-80 doesn't dissolve past 10oz per gal.

Am I missing something?

Oh, and how much Ox do you mix per gal to DS? By weight or dry measure?

Thanks

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

Hey guys i was wondering what was the safest and quickest way to strip a deck. what products do some of you guys use and how do you apply it!! Thanks in advance!!!!!! Jared

This question has been asked literally dozens of times in one form or another...

I am going to err on the side of caution here and suggest you use the search feature first and learn more about this subject.

Happy reading.

Rod!~

[MMI Enterprises 289]

Joel, surely that is not the limit.For instance you can get lbs. and lbs. of NaOH in a gal.

There is a faq on bottom of this page for hd80: Extreme Solutions - Quality Restoration Products ..

extended info-

Extreme Solutions - Quality Restoration Products

..btw, you need to know your DSratio/factor before you settle on 20oz of anything.. i.e- 1:5 (20% streamer) = 6x .. so 20oz/6= 3.33oz per gal TTW

[plainpainter 217]

Kevin - I tried dissolving HD-80 into water, and unless the planets were in a very strange alignment that day - I think HD-80 has extremely poor disolving rates. That's not to say you can't get it to dissolve as spec'd by the manufacturer - Russell has never sold HD-80 as a downstreamable product. But having tried to make it 'downstreamable' my first attempt failed.

[MMI Enterprises 289]

Fair enough Dan..thanx. Since I use another stripper all I can do is go off what others say. Ken says ya can get the half tub in so....

Dry volume measure complicates things.. I should go less and count more on the other ingredients. Burned my wrist the other day and it kinda hurts. :o

ps-- if it were straight hydroxide we could use the following link to see that half lb of hydroxide (8oz.) converted to dry volume is closer to 3/4 cup than what is listed on ESO faq for hd80. For hd80 they say 2/3 cup.

Here ya go, pick a chem: Weight to Volume conversion online.

[Celeste 341]

Maybe Kevin can do a Youtube vid on stripping a deck for you

[jeffex11 121]

Ok so I ordered a tub of HD 80 roughly $6 a gal with shipping costs vs the $8 I pay for my cleaner at Atlantic pressure washers . If it works as well or hopefully better then I'll ge tthe big tub and have learned something new!!! I just did deck with a stain that for the first time in 16 yrs I couldn't get the old stain off the house the homeowner got on there when they tried to do the job. It was a previous owner who did the job and the new owner call us from a referral. We got the stain off the deck but it took several dwell times with our cleaner. I suspected for the last 2 yrs they were cutting this stuff down a little more and selling for the same price. I think the stain was cabbots because the local hardware store sells at on of it in this high end neighborhood. Some areas had sooo much stain floating on top it had a gloss to it . I hope no deck company did this job but we managed to get the deck saved. I'll post a few pictures but they didn't come out well.

[Beth n Rod 1,279]

Jeff,

I didn't want to say anything, but that is exactly the same reason I stopped buying from them. I used to get a really decent gutter cleaner from them and one day I went to buy another couple of gallons to go along with the one I had in the back of my truck for a job I was going to do. I compared them and they were lighter in color. Asked them about it and they said they make it there but sometimes the color is different. (lighter but not different mind you). In comparison, they were diluting it and selling it for the same price. I was pissed. Haven't bought from them since.

Rod!~

[James 625]

Quickest way to strip a deck is too know what the product is that your stripping, Have done a test spot to determine if it's doable , understanding dwell time, The more experience you have will determine and allow you to make the correct decision . Experimenting with different products and different methods and what type of equipment you have should be added to the equation .

[jeffex11 121]

ditto ! for me. I'm no fool I can see the color is lighter! especially this year. they are convient for me and their products have worked so I didn't change . The materials cost of deck restoration is passed on to the customer. Very low compared to labor cost. Taking extra time to acheive your standard of results can't be recovered. Luckily I priced the job for the puddled stain and blotchy mess so I still made out but I don't like NOT gettin all the old stain off the house. 1st time for me. Hell I may go back and try the HD80 on it just to see. They are great people and will be life long customers I'm sure so I'll invest my time showing my level of commitment to this biz. Even an old dog like me can learn something new I hope HD80 is what I'm looking for. I've had to learn to use new stains in the past few yrs after many many yrs with sherwin williams so I guess its time to move on to a new chem supply.

[jeffex11 121]

I washed the gutters and part of the roof the week before and did a test spot on the deck evident in the before picture of the step near the slider. I noticed then how hard it was to get off but I did NOT try cleaning the mess left by the old homeowner on the house at that time

[RPetry 564]

Jeff,

Jim made a good point in another thread concerning stripping. Some stain products are becoming more difficult to remove due to reformulations, either to conform with VOC regs or just manufacturing costs.

The species of wood can also be a factor in stripping difficulty. Attached are two pics of a job we did last week. The full balustrade is composed of clear western red cedar, the floor and fascia of true red mahogany.

Two separate coats of Cabot's ATO, mahogany flame color, were on the wood. At least one of those were the VOC compliant product.

The mahogany stripped out nicely with 6 oz./gal. of ACR 760 NaOH only. The cedar needed 8 oz./gal, ACR's 633-ADD booster at 8 oz./gal., plus a thickening agent. Even at this strength, some sanding needed to be done. At that, a close look will show traces of ATO still remaining.

[jeffex11 121]

NICE!!!!!great resto on that deck . the reformulation of stains due to VOC regs is something we have to keep up with and live with in this biz. I believe the dilution of the product I used was the key factor here. I have no idea of what product it truley was but I have NEVER run into something I couldn't get off the house before. Its not my job to be a chemist . I count on my suppliers to sell me products that work so I can sell my services. but I will not be using that cleaner any longer if the hd80 works. The same as my customers will drop me if I can't get the job done better than they can. I had to stumble through the VOC changes on wherwin williams UV sunblock that they called deckscapes after the change in formulation. JUNK ,FADED FAST , dropped it from my service. I had to recoat a few decks to keep my customers happy out of pocket and they appreciated my dedication to serving them. I recovered nicely and that commitment moved on to other products that fit my business model. Same thing goes for this cleaner . I would rather pay more for the stuff that works . The thing about cleaner is applying more of a weaker strength cleaner doesn't work . It is the concentration level that is important in being effective.

[RPetry 564]

Jeff,

Guess we are lucky, am not aware of any manu. changing product composition on us. Started with HD-80, went with Bob's F-18, and now use ACR's 760 stripper. Tested a few others for different manus. To be honest, most NaOH strippers are very similar. The main reason we use ACR's is we can purchase in 50 lb. buckets as I make a run up to Easton, Pa. a few times during the season. 760 is also much cheaper, and just as effective.

Same with stain. Changed over to Ready Seal about 5 years ago. Aside from an improved mildewcide formulation this year, AFAIK, the product has not changed one bit.

[PressurePros 249]

Rick, that is the way its done. You are an artisan and a credit to the craft.

[jeffex11 121]

I'm not ready to change over to a stain I can't get off the shelf and convienient unless it has properties I can't get anywhere else. No store in my drive line carries it and the stuff I use has had good reviews from my customers .. I drank a few beers on a deck I did last yr last night and they love the stain so thats what I go by.... my customers tell me what works for them at my prices.... Not to say I won't use ready seal.. I just haven't yet. You can teach an old dog new tricks if it makes him money