Can I clean my home's exterior with a pressure cleaner?

[i61w]

Hi, im wanting to clean the exterior of my house with a spray foam, can i do it with the  water tank on the back of my ryobi pressure cleaner?

[EricL]

Hello @i61w 

Welcome to the Bunnings Workshop community. It's sensational to have you join us, and thank you for sharing your question about cleaning the exterior of your house.

It is possible to use the small tank at the back of your Ryobi pressure washer, depending on the size of the tank you might end up refilling it quite often. I suggest having a look if the Ryobi 600ml Pressure Washer Detergent Bottle is compatible with your Ryobi set. The bottle will allow you to spray longer between refills. 

To wash the exterior of your house, I propose looking at the Gerni 2.5L Exterior House Wash. This detergent concentrate is great for washing brick, timber and coated steel exteriors. I suggest testing it on a small area first to make sure that it will work with your house wall. 

Another way to clean the exterior of your house is to use 30 Seconds 5L Outdoor Cleaner Concentrate. I suggest using an Aqua Systems 5L Garden Pressure Sprayer Kit to get an even spray on your house wall. Make sure to give the product enough activation time before washing it off with your pressure washer.

Please makes sure to wear personal protection such as gloves, goggles and a mask when spraying your house.

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric

[MikeTNZ]

Hi @i61w,

Hey welcome along here and thanks for asking the question.

First question is what sort of building do you have?

Is it brick veneer or Somerhill stone as a veneer or something else?

A picture of what we are dealing with would be awesome.

If you have a weather-board house, you don't want to be putting high pressure water into something like this.

With pressure washers, you need to be careful around your windows and doors, some of these units can run at up to 2100 - 3700 kPa.

Stay away from any windows if you can, you can blow out the outer seals on the windows, if they are from the years of 1975- 1990, these could

be perished.

Personally, if your house is particularly dirty, I would use cold water with a 42 ° spray nozzle, this will give you your best cleaning effect.

I say this as a Fire-fighter that knows how water works with cleaning things, too much water and too much pressure can make things worse than what they were before you started.

Let me know your thoughts on this before you start.

Cheers,

Mike T.

[Ready2go]

I'm planning to repaint my house which is solid Bessa-block. I was planning to use my Karcher pressure washer beforehand to clean the old paint and possibly remove any paint that would be likely to peel. I know I'll have to do my windows by hand- possibly strip the old paint off with a heatgun

can anyone see any issues with my plan?

[EricL]

Hello @Ready2go 

Thanks for letting us know about the material of your wall. @MikeTNZ makes an excellent point that too much pressure from the pressure washer will damage the surface of your wall. With the Ryobi pressure washer, the soap dispensing unit only works when it is on low pressure. I strongly recommend putting the pressure washer on its lowest setting and being at least 2-meters away from the wall when you wash the soap off. Any closer and the water might eat into the Besser block wall.

I recommend doing your windows after the walls have been washed. It's best to strip the window frame clean of paint and placing the primer on as soon as possible. This is to prevent the bare wood from being exposed to the weather.

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric