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Gutter MaintenanceUncategorized

Expert Advice on Cleaning the Exterior of Your Home

By February 5, 2013October 16th, 2023No Comments

Most people have a pretty good handle on how to clean a residential gutter. But what about an industrial gutter or the exterior of a home? Should these cleaning tasks be handled differently?

One approach is to use a pressure-washing system. For more information about this method, we asked Craig Schuster of Equipment Trade Service Company to offer some helpful advice.

1. What are some important tools to use when cleaning industrial gutters?

  • a good pressure washer with a high psi and gpm output
  • a wand long enough to reach the gutters
  • a good, adjustable nozzle curved correctly to get into the gutter

With these three things, any good contractor can easily clean any gutter they come across.

2. How often should industrial gutters be cleaned?

We recommend a minimum of once a year, but any time there is excessive debris or storms with high winds, one should have their gutters checked.

3. What types of projects is pressure washing generally used for?

There are dozens of projects that are perfect for pressure washing, You can check out the list on my website here.

4. What types of customers use your products and services?

Our customer base can range from homeowners, small businesses, repair shops, distributors, school districts, local city and town governments up to and including US and foreign government agencies, large businesses, contractors, and janitorial supply houses.

5. Your company has been in business since 1970. How have the needs of your customers changed over the last four decades?

We started out as primarily a repair shop in Eastern Pennsylvania; but as we started doing more and more repairs, our customers started looking to us to provide them not only with repairs, but with parts so they could do the repairs themselves. Then we started to manufacture chemicals for cleaning that go hand-in-hand with pressure washers and steam cleaners. From there, we created Taginator® and Tagaway® Graffiti Removers for the city of Philadelphia to use on their Anti-Graffiti Brigade. We then launched into the world of e-commerce to further our reaches outside of PA and the USA. As of today, over 75% of our yearly sales come from out of state and/or out of the country.

6. What are some of the mistakes people often make while pressure washing?

Most often, the mistakes people will make involve trying to use an underpowered machine for their pressure washing. They should make sure that their GPM and PSI will give enough force to the water for cleaning whatever it is that needs to be cleaned — without being too overpowering, which could cause damage.

Another mistake often made is not using the correct water temperature for the job. Most small jobs can be done with a cold pressure washer; but larger, messier jobs need the heat of a hot pressure washer. While a hot pressure washer can do cold pressure washer jobs, a cold pressure washer will most likely not work on a job requiring hot water.

7. What do you say to people who are concerned about the chemicals in the cleaners that your company uses?

All of the cleaning chemicals that we manufacture are created in accordance with the highest safety practices. We also provide MSDS sheets with every shipment of chemical that goes out to customers, regardless of the HAZMAT or Non-HAZMAT status of the product. On these MSDS sheets, there is a toll-free number to a 24-hour company that also has all of our chemicals’ MSDS sheets. They can inform users of the steps needed to be taken with any specific spill or accident.

Images: etscompany.com