Most of what decides the outcome of an exterior clean is settled before anyone arrives, by what is on the vehicle. An operator with one machine and one nozzle will use that machine and that nozzle on your sandstone, because it is what they have.
So here is the kit, and more usefully, what each piece is for.
The pressure unit, and the number that actually matters
Everyone quotes PSI. Flow rate matters more.
Pressure is force at the surface. Flow — litres per minute — is volume moving contamination away. Cleaning is mostly flow; damage is mostly pressure. A machine with high pressure and low flow is a surface-destroying machine that cleans slowly, which is exactly the hardware sold cheaply to households.
Useful professional work runs meaningful flow at moderate pressure, with the pressure dialled to the substrate rather than left at maximum. More: what the specs actually mean.
Nozzles, which are the real control
The nozzle decides what the water does, and the spread is the setting that matters.
A zero degree jet is a pencil of water that will cut mortar, carve timber and etch stone. It has almost no legitimate residential use. Fifteen degrees is for hard concrete stain work. Twenty-five and forty degrees are general purpose. A low-pressure soaping tip applies chemistry without force.
Turbo and rotary nozzles spin a zero degree jet in a cone — fast on hard concrete, catastrophic on anything soft, and responsible for a great deal of the paver damage we are called to look at.
An operator carrying one nozzle has one answer to every surface.
The surface cleaner
A flat disc with rotating jets under a shroud, run across driveways and paths. It produces even coverage at a consistent distance, which is why a professional driveway has no stripes.
Zebra striping on concrete is the signature of wand work: overlapping passes at inconsistent distance and angle. Once striped, the only fix is doing the whole slab again properly. More: driveway cleaning.
The soft wash system, which is a different machine entirely
Soft washing is not a pressure washer turned down. It is a separate low-pressure pump delivering a measured chemical mix at roughly garden-hose pressure, through a long-range nozzle or a telescopic lance.
The work is done by chemistry and dwell time, not force. This is the correct system for roofs, render, texture coat, timber, fibre cement and most cladding — everything where force would remove the surface along with the growth.
A business without a soft wash system cannot clean your roof correctly. They can only pressure wash it, which is why they will tell you pressure washing a roof is fine. More: how we soft wash and why roofs never get pressure.
Water-fed pole and purified water, for glass
Glass at height is cleaned with a telescopic brush fed by purified water — deionised or reverse osmosis — because ordinary tap water carries dissolved minerals that dry as spots.
Purified water leaves nothing behind, so the glass dries clear without squeegee work and without a ladder against the wall. On coastal properties it also lets us keep rinsing salt out of frames and tracks, which is where the haze keeps coming back from. More: salt film versus hard water and window tracks and sills.
Tanks, filtration and the question of whose water
Tanks on board matter for two reasons: flow rate the house tap cannot sustain, and jobs where mains water is not available or not appropriate.
Filtration protects the pumps and protects the result — sediment through a nozzle marks surfaces.
And the tank is what allows us to work above a disconnected rainwater system without using the property’s own supply. More: how much water the work uses.
Access equipment
Ladders rated for commercial use rather than domestic, levelling feet for Sydney’s sloping ground, and standoff brackets so the ladder bears on the wall instead of crushing the gutter.
Beyond ladder work: harness and anchor arrangements, and for brittle or steep roofs, a platform so nobody walks on tile that breaks under weight. Old terracotta and early cement tiles are the usual reason. More: does roof cleaning damage tiles.
The diagnostic kit, which costs almost nothing
A tapping tool to find drummy render and loose cladding before a lance does. A moisture meter for timber, because oiling a deck that has not dried gives you a cloudy finish and a callback. A camera, because the photo report is the deliverable on everything you cannot see.
And a pH-neutral test kit approach to stone: identify the material before choosing chemistry, because acid on carbonate stone is permanent. More: the walk-around before we quote.
Protection and containment
The least interesting gear and often the difference between a clean job and a claim: plastic sheeting and tape for fittings and power points, drop sheets for planting, covers for air conditioning condensers, pit covers and sandbags for containment, and bags and bins for gutter debris and scraped growth.
More: what gets masked before anything gets wet.
Chemistry, stored properly
Sodium hypochlorite and surfactants for soft washing. Dedicated degreasers for oil. Rust removers, which are a different chemistry again. Alkaline cleaners for some masonry, neutral cleaners for stone. Breathable impregnating sealers rather than film formers.
What should not be on the truck: hydrochloric acid brick cleaner anywhere near sandstone, limestone or travertine. It dissolves carbonate stone, and most of the ruined Sydney stone we are asked to assess was ruined with it.
What to look at when the vehicle arrives
Whether there is a separate low-pressure system, or one machine for everything. Whether there is a nozzle selection. Whether there is a surface cleaner for your driveway. Whether there is anything on board for protecting what is not being cleaned.
It is a thirty-second assessment and it predicts the result fairly reliably.
