Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: [GQC] Tim on January 24, 2011, 09:10:56 am
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I thought it would be a good idea to thoroughly do a review on this brush for anyone who is looking to buy one of these brushes. I hope it gives you a decent idea of what the brush is like.
Gardiner Pole Systems Superlite Dual Trim Flocked 15 degrees splay review
(http://www.gardinerpolesystems.co.uk/acatalog/Super-Lite_Flocked_nosocket_250.jpg)
When testing out this brush I’ve asked myself the question whether there is such a thing as a perfect WFP brush.
Most window cleaners use the water fed pole system for more than just cleaning windows, so the ideal brush should be able to be good at more than one cleaning aspect.
I don’t think there is a brush that does 100% of everything you ask it from it, but I do think there are a number of factors that make up a great WFP brush.
In my opinion the following qualities should be expected from a great brush, in no particular order:
- Lightness.
- Little water retention.
- Ease of use, i.e. easy splay without needing unnecessary pressure to clean.
- Scrubbing Power.
- Little dirt retention.
- Ability to rinse on the glass safely.
- Dual trim or Full trim depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Flocked or Mono filament depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Jet spacing/placement.
- Brush stock overhang (how much the brush stock continues after the bristles stop).
- No stiffness or skipping over glass.
(- Brush size)
So how does the Gardiner Pole Systems brush perform when taking these factors in consideration?
99% of all my work is just cleaning windows and upvc, so this summary is focussed more on those areas than anything else, but should hopefully give you a good impression on how the brush performs.
Let’s quickly just list here the types of windows most window cleaners will clean during typical residential and commercial work, and further down I will explain how this brush performs when used on these windows.
- Types of frames encountered: upvc, aluminium, painted.
- Plain sheets of float glass, hydrophobic and hydrophilic.
- Georgian panes subcategorized in either painted, individually placed in upvc, or stick on upvc.
- Leaded lights.
- Stick on leaded windows.
- Sash windows.
In my work, I would ideally like a single brush that offers great cleaning power, with the ability to rinse on safely and also needs to have great ease of use, so it doesn’t make you too tired or even annoyed.
A good place to start with any brush is to just inspect it without using it on the glass, and quickly look at some of the obvious qualities and downfalls of a particular brush.
The (abbreviated GPSSDTF15DS!) brush itself comes with a black 260mm wide stock, which is quite a good residential size, and is fitted with 2 2mm pencil jets spaced 5.5cm or so from the end of the stock.
The screw thread socket seems to be a much improved model from the first generation brushes and seems to be much sturdier and also a much stronger, thicker thread. It should be much more resilient and preventing the dreaded swivelling of a well used brush. Still, like any other brush, it will mostly depend on how often you change brush heads.
The brush really is a lightweight, weighing only 250 grams. It should be an eye opener for people using heavy brushes, especially Vikan owners. But it should even surprise people who aren’t using heavy weight brushes.
The brush design is of the Dual Trim nature, where the inner trim is shorter than the outer trim. When the outer trim splays, the stiffer inner bristles engage and provide even more scrubbing power. Furthermore, the brush is semi flocked, meaning that the outer trim is the only part of the bristle trim that is flocked. The inner trim is completely made up of non flocked monofilament bristles.
Interestingly, the flocked outer bristles aren’t as flocked as let’s say a Vikan. Semi flocked in more than one way indeed.
What’s the reasoning and technical importance behind flocked brushes?
The main difference is the way that flocked bristle ends interact with the glass surface. Monofilaments tend to skid across the surface of the glass which means that they have to have more scrubbing pressure applied to fully clean the surface. Flocked filaments, due to their softer ends, glide across the glass surface covering a greater area per bristle. This means that they tend to clean the glass more effectively with less pressure.
The inner trim, like most Gardiner Pole Systems Dual Trim brushes, isn’t that well populated with bristles. There is a large gap around the pencil jets, most probably so people can easily fit fanjets without having to remove any bristles themselves. Whether this impacts the scrubbing power of the brush is a question that will probably remain unanswered, but I think it would be a good to see a more populated inner trim to maximize scrubbing power and area covered.
The bristles seem nice and soft, and when trying it out on a flat surface, the brush splays very nicely without much effort needed. This should be good!
Impressions when in use
Like with a lot of things, first impressions count, and boy does this brush deliver!
This brush really brought a smile on my face. I’ve had been using a 10” Aquafactors Dual Trim brush (similar to a Tucker) for some time, which ultimately, after some modifying, weighed in at about 400 grams. To go straight to a lightweight brush like this is such a great experience. It really seems that in feel and ease of use alone, you lose about 1Kg for every 100g shed of a WFP brush!
The drop in weight makes the whole brush and pole assembly (if combined with a light carbon fibre pole) a precision tool. It easily allows you to place the brush exactly where you want it to go, without any strain in your back muscles or arms. You can really whip the pole about with seemingly little to no effort at all. Of course that is partially because of me using an SL-X, but you should see a great improvement even on fibreglass poles, or any other carbon fibre pole for that matter.
A second first impression (?) I had was the ease of use it delivered. I’m not sure if some of you have noticed the same thing, but I really dislike a brush that needs a lot of force to splay. Especially with Dual Trim brushes, where it’s quite essential that the inner trim engages properly. This brush does seem to melt very nicely on the glass, and splays without much effort at all. Little to no energy is wasted in this way. Every bit helps when you are doing a lot of repetitive work.
Scrubbing power for a brush this size and weight, with relatively few bristles is actually very impressive. Compared to the aforementioned Aquafactors brush, it is virtually on par. It is even more impressive if you solely look at how many bristles a Tucker/Aquafactors brush has, and then compare it to the brush reviewed.
First cleans on upvc and glass do show great scrubbing power, the same counts for any other material found on the glass apart from typical dirt. Bird muck just flies off without any soaking and insect dropping and the like need little scrubbing to come off as well. Idem ditto for snail trails.
A light brush ideally needs to be kept light. 50ml of water is 50gram. So if your brush retains a lot of water it really can weigh the brush down. Luckily this brush does not retain much water at all. It seems to retain a little bit more than a monofilament brush, but overall, not too much of a problem.
What I found most interesting is the water retention comparison I made between a Superlite Mono (Mark1) and this brush. For this simple test I weighed the brushes when completely dry, and then weighed them after submersing them in a bucket of water, taking it out, and tilting the brush several time till it stopped dripping. No shaking of the brush was done. Just letting the excess of water run away. The test was repeated twice and the average was taken.
The Superlite Mono weighed in 293g dry. And wet it was 363g. A difference of 70 grams.
The Superlite Flocked as reviewed here weighed in 289g dry. It was 335g wet. A difference of 46g.
So what we can see here is that between these two brushes a difference of 24 grams existed. I was convinced the flocked brush would weigh more when wet. But I was proven wrong. 24 grams isn’t much, but every little helps I guess.
So a flocked brush is the standard by default then? It sounds great?!
Well, yes and no. In my humble opinion, the only way to properly use a water fed pole day in day out is to rinse with the brush on. This greatly reduces fatigue and strain. You wouldn’t lift off at 60ft, so there really shouldn’t be any point in lifting off at 14ft or lower. This is where brush choice comes in.
Due to the inherent nature of a flocked brush, it holds on to quite a lot more dirt then standard non flocked brushes. On regular maintenance cleans, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem, but even on regular work, you can pick up a lot of dirt from sills etc. So on more dirty work you will see a lot more dirt retained in the brush. If you go from side to side on a cross-section of upvc, bits of dirt will keep coming out quite a bit longer then a monofilament brush.
Does this matter when rinsing on with the brush? Logically one would seem to think so. But on regular, not too dirty cleans I have found that the finish is just as good when rinsing with the brush on.
My opinion on this is that there is a difference between non soluble dirt and soluble dirt. The bits that you see in the brush and cobwebs etc, don’t seem to make much of a difference in spotting. Remember that spotting occurs because of dissolved dirt that dries up in spots.
So I believe there is more to it then you would first think.
Water flow through the brush is then most important, so that dissolved dirt can make its way through the brush and then rinse down the window. A steady 2lpm or more from the brushhead is ideal when rinsing with the brush on, but brush design is equally important.
What you can see with the Superlite Dual Trim Flocked is that water does seem to slow down quite a bit as opposed to a monofilament brush. This requires a slight slowdown in rinsing, to make sure the water can make its way through, carrying the dirt along with it.
This, in my opinion, is the reason why you can use a flocked brush on regular maintenance cleans. It’s therefore not a beginner’s brush, since there are several things to look out for, and technique needs to be adjusted on a window to window basis.
As with all Dual Trim brushes, this one as well lends itself for a lot more than just glass cleaning. It makes cleaning upvc frames very easy due to the difference in trim height. I guess the choice between a full trim or double or dual trim brushes will greatly depend on the user preference and the material worked on.
So how did it cope with the windows it was used on?
Cleaning frames was a breeze with good scrubbing power, but also very quick to glide across the frames and cross bars, hence very little drag was experienced, and the overall speed increased and fatigue decreased.
On the glass side, the brush glides even more easily over the glass then the over UPVC and showed excellent stability, splay and scrubbing performance. Not much folding over of the bristles because of the 15 degree splay.
If anything I found hydrophobic windows easier and quicker to clean because the water could be nicely guided down the glass on severely hydrophobic glass. Due to the slowdown of water in the flocked brushes, the water curtain on hydrophilic glass seemed to slow down quite a bit more then with a mono filament brush. Georgian panes are not much trouble with less resistance felt then on my mono brushes, so again more pleasurable to use. I’ve found the same to be true on leaded lights, traditional and stick on.
Sash windows again are no problems, and with the nice splay of the brush it really helps getting into the corners.
Keeping all these factors of brush engineering and manufacturing in mind when creating the ultimate window cleaning brush is no small feat indeed, and I think over the years Gardiner pole systems have shown to really excel in this field. They deliver consistent product updates with many improvements. Customer feedback seems to be taken on board whenever revisions are made to make sure the customer is pleased.
To sum up things, I think this brush is excellent value for money. When keeping rinsing with the brush on in mind, I do not think it’s a brush that can easily be used by beginners.
If rinsing with the brush on is preferred, I think for many, a mono brush would be a better starter brush. As long as a brush limitations are kept in mind this brush can be used on a variety of surfaces, and with a variety of cleaning techniques. Because people just starting out with a wfp system often find it a very steep learning curve with lots to keep in mind, I think this might be more of a brush for the advanced user. Again I guess this will greatly depend on what you will use the brush for. In my view this brush needs a bit more attention in use then a standard monofilament brush.
This brush will now be one of the few brushes I take with me, and have proven to be an excellent addition to my arsenal of brushes.
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First class post!!!
I have just started using this brush, so far only on curtain wall but already it has proved to be a great brush. This brush combined with my superlite 51 has me converted all the way to Gardiners poles in future.
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Mate....what a post and review. Spot on.
Ps - is it raining there, coz thats one hell of a review for ten past 9 in the morning. ;D ;D ;D
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Thanks for the review.
Recently switched from the sl dt mono to a rectangular vikan flocked and find the vikan gives a better clean and is a bit quicker (also use less water).
Based on your review think I will give the sl flocked a try.
One thing I don't like about the sl is the water comes out the jets too forcefully, which means if you rinse off the glass the water splashes and sprays back and goes places you don't want it to. (Should be easy to remedy though by fitting some slightly bigger jets.
Out of interest did you have to convert the Aquafactors brush, as far as I know they are desinged to fit their own gooseneck?
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Strewth! When's the book coming out?
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Strewth! When's the book coming out?
That was the book, it's the film next.
Good review thanks
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I never use mine on maintenance cleans because I've been caught before by the bristles trailing the glass on a rinse and leaving spots.
Still reckon black is a ridiculous colour for bristles - you need to be able to see any contamination in my opinion and clean it when required. Good brush for first cleans but I always finish off with a dual trim mono.
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Thanks guys.
Mate....what a post and review. Spot on.
Ps - is it raining there, coz thats one hell of a review for ten past 9 in the morning. ;D ;D ;D
I wrote it when I was away on holiday, I didn't actually get as much time on the glass as I wanted due to snow and illness during the last month or so.
I did another maintenance clean today with a lot of gothic type painted windows. Did one with rinse on, one with rinse off, and continued that for about 20 windows or so. All the ones where I rinsed with the brush on they came up perfectly, no problems at all. These weren't too dirty, but was still quite pleased!
Thanks for the review.
Recently switched from the sl dt mono to a rectangular vikan flocked and find the vikan gives a better clean and is a bit quicker (also use less water).
Based on your review think I will give the sl flocked a try.
One thing I don't like about the sl is the water comes out the jets too forcefully, which means if you rinse off the glass the water splashes and sprays back and goes places you don't want it to. (Should be easy to remedy though by fitting some slightly bigger jets.
Out of interest did you have to convert the Aquafactors brush, as far as I know they are desinged to fit their own gooseneck?
Yes I did convert that one, I completely bypassed the holes that were in the stock already and just drilled some holes in there and put some pencil jets in there, closer to the edge of the brush. Also I fitted a standard screwtype stock so I can use it on my poles. :)
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ive been using mine for a few months now.didnt like it at first but its grown on me!!i use it for nearly all of my maintenance cleans and its an excellent brush!great for leaded windows and georgian.and i like the fact its black!! ;) ;D ;D.i always rinse brush off on all my work as im not confident of doing a good job otherwise! ;D ;D
dazmond
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Superb review! ;)
I agree with your findings, I really like it too. I'm now using the Xtreme brush at the mo' & would love a semi-flocked version of this too. :D
All good stuff.
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i have aproblem with the gardiner brush with the fact they dont last very long,if i get 12-18mth out of one that be the lot.
i have vikan which is 4years old and still looking newish.
i do love the gardiner brush but they aint made to last.
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i have aproblem with the gardiner brush with the fact they dont last very long,if i get 12-18mth out of one that be the lot.
i have vikan which is 4years old and still looking newish.
i do love the gardiner brush but they aint made to last.
Tight ass ;D
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I thought it would be a good idea to thoroughly do a review on this brush for anyone who is looking to buy one of these brushes. I hope it gives you a decent idea of what the brush is like.
Gardiner Pole Systems Superlite Dual Trim Flocked 15 degrees splay review
(http://www.gardinerpolesystems.co.uk/acatalog/Super-Lite_Flocked_nosocket_250.jpg)
When testing out this brush I’ve asked myself the question whether there is such a thing as a perfect WFP brush.
Most window cleaners use the water fed pole system for more than just cleaning windows, so the ideal brush should be able to be good at more than one cleaning aspect.
I don’t think there is a brush that does 100% of everything you ask it from it, but I do think there are a number of factors that make up a great WFP brush.
In my opinion the following qualities should be expected from a great brush, in no particular order:
- Lightness.
- Little water retention.
- Ease of use, i.e. easy splay without needing unnecessary pressure to clean.
- Scrubbing Power.
- Little dirt retention.
- Ability to rinse on the glass safely.
- Dual trim or Full trim depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Flocked or Mono filament depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Jet spacing/placement.
- Brush stock overhang (how much the brush stock continues after the bristles stop).
- No stiffness or skipping over glass.
(- Brush size)
So how does the Gardiner Pole Systems brush perform when taking these factors in consideration?
99% of all my work is just cleaning windows and upvc, so this summary is focussed more on those areas than anything else, but should hopefully give you a good impression on how the brush performs.
Let’s quickly just list here the types of windows most window cleaners will clean during typical residential and commercial work, and further down I will explain how this brush performs when used on these windows.
- Types of frames encountered: upvc, aluminium, painted.
- Plain sheets of float glass, hydrophobic and hydrophilic.
- Georgian panes subcategorized in either painted, individually placed in upvc, or stick on upvc.
- Leaded lights.
- Stick on leaded windows.
- Sash windows.
In my work, I would ideally like a single brush that offers great cleaning power, with the ability to rinse on safely and also needs to have great ease of use, so it doesn’t make you too tired or even annoyed.
A good place to start with any brush is to just inspect it without using it on the glass, and quickly look at some of the obvious qualities and downfalls of a particular brush.
The (abbreviated GPSSDTF15DS!) brush itself comes with a black 260mm wide stock, which is quite a good residential size, and is fitted with 2 2mm pencil jets spaced 5.5cm or so from the end of the stock.
The screw thread socket seems to be a much improved model from the first generation brushes and seems to be much sturdier and also a much stronger, thicker thread. It should be much more resilient and preventing the dreaded swivelling of a well used brush. Still, like any other brush, it will mostly depend on how often you change brush heads.
The brush really is a lightweight, weighing only 250 grams. It should be an eye opener for people using heavy brushes, especially Vikan owners. But it should even surprise people who aren’t using heavy weight brushes.
The brush design is of the Dual Trim nature, where the inner trim is shorter than the outer trim. When the outer trim splays, the stiffer inner bristles engage and provide even more scrubbing power. Furthermore, the brush is semi flocked, meaning that the outer trim is the only part of the bristle trim that is flocked. The inner trim is completely made up of non flocked monofilament bristles.
Interestingly, the flocked outer bristles aren’t as flocked as let’s say a Vikan. Semi flocked in more than one way indeed.
What’s the reasoning and technical importance behind flocked brushes?
The main difference is the way that flocked bristle ends interact with the glass surface. Monofilaments tend to skid across the surface of the glass which means that they have to have more scrubbing pressure applied to fully clean the surface. Flocked filaments, due to their softer ends, glide across the glass surface covering a greater area per bristle. This means that they tend to clean the glass more effectively with less pressure.
The inner trim, like most Gardiner Pole Systems Dual Trim brushes, isn’t that well populated with bristles. There is a large gap around the pencil jets, most probably so people can easily fit fanjets without having to remove any bristles themselves. Whether this impacts the scrubbing power of the brush is a question that will probably remain unanswered, but I think it would be a good to see a more populated inner trim to maximize scrubbing power and area covered.
The bristles seem nice and soft, and when trying it out on a flat surface, the brush splays very nicely without much effort needed. This should be good!
Impressions when in use
Like with a lot of things, first impressions count, and boy does this brush deliver!
This brush really brought a smile on my face. I’ve had been using a 10” Aquafactors Dual Trim brush (similar to a Tucker) for some time, which ultimately, after some modifying, weighed in at about 400 grams. To go straight to a lightweight brush like this is such a great experience. It really seems that in feel and ease of use alone, you lose about 1Kg for every 100g shed of a WFP brush!
The drop in weight makes the whole brush and pole assembly (if combined with a light carbon fibre pole) a precision tool. It easily allows you to place the brush exactly where you want it to go, without any strain in your back muscles or arms. You can really whip the pole about with seemingly little to no effort at all. Of course that is partially because of me using an SL-X, but you should see a great improvement even on fibreglass poles, or any other carbon fibre pole for that matter.
A second first impression (?) I had was the ease of use it delivered. I’m not sure if some of you have noticed the same thing, but I really dislike a brush that needs a lot of force to splay. Especially with Dual Trim brushes, where it’s quite essential that the inner trim engages properly. This brush does seem to melt very nicely on the glass, and splays without much effort at all. Little to no energy is wasted in this way. Every bit helps when you are doing a lot of repetitive work.
Scrubbing power for a brush this size and weight, with relatively few bristles is actually very impressive. Compared to the aforementioned Aquafactors brush, it is virtually on par. It is even more impressive if you solely look at how many bristles a Tucker/Aquafactors brush has, and then compare it to the brush reviewed.
First cleans on upvc and glass do show great scrubbing power, the same counts for any other material found on the glass apart from typical dirt. Bird muck just flies off without any soaking and insect dropping and the like need little scrubbing to come off as well. Idem ditto for snail trails.
A light brush ideally needs to be kept light. 50ml of water is 50gram. So if your brush retains a lot of water it really can weigh the brush down. Luckily this brush does not retain much water at all. It seems to retain a little bit more than a monofilament brush, but overall, not too much of a problem.
What I found most interesting is the water retention comparison I made between a Superlite Mono (Mark1) and this brush. For this simple test I weighed the brushes when completely dry, and then weighed them after submersing them in a bucket of water, taking it out, and tilting the brush several time till it stopped dripping. No shaking of the brush was done. Just letting the excess of water run away. The test was repeated twice and the average was taken.
The Superlite Mono weighed in 293g dry. And wet it was 363g. A difference of 70 grams.
The Superlite Flocked as reviewed here weighed in 289g dry. It was 335g wet. A difference of 46g.
So what we can see here is that between these two brushes a difference of 24 grams existed. I was convinced the flocked brush would weigh more when wet. But I was proven wrong. 24 grams isn’t much, but every little helps I guess.
So a flocked brush is the standard by default then? It sounds great?!
Well, yes and no. In my humble opinion, the only way to properly use a water fed pole day in day out is to rinse with the brush on. This greatly reduces fatigue and strain. You wouldn’t lift off at 60ft, so there really shouldn’t be any point in lifting off at 14ft or lower. This is where brush choice comes in.
Due to the inherent nature of a flocked brush, it holds on to quite a lot more dirt then standard non flocked brushes. On regular maintenance cleans, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem, but even on regular work, you can pick up a lot of dirt from sills etc. So on more dirty work you will see a lot more dirt retained in the brush. If you go from side to side on a cross-section of upvc, bits of dirt will keep coming out quite a bit longer then a monofilament brush.
Does this matter when rinsing on with the brush? Logically one would seem to think so. But on regular, not too dirty cleans I have found that the finish is just as good when rinsing with the brush on.
My opinion on this is that there is a difference between non soluble dirt and soluble dirt. The bits that you see in the brush and cobwebs etc, don’t seem to make much of a difference in spotting. Remember that spotting occurs because of dissolved dirt that dries up in spots.
So I believe there is more to it then you would first think.
Water flow through the brush is then most important, so that dissolved dirt can make its way through the brush and then rinse down the window. A steady 2lpm or more from the brushhead is ideal when rinsing with the brush on, but brush design is equally important.
What you can see with the Superlite Dual Trim Flocked is that water does seem to slow down quite a bit as opposed to a monofilament brush. This requires a slight slowdown in rinsing, to make sure the water can make its way through, carrying the dirt along with it.
This, in my opinion, is the reason why you can use a flocked brush on regular maintenance cleans. It’s therefore not a beginner’s brush, since there are several things to look out for, and technique needs to be adjusted on a window to window basis.
As with all Dual Trim brushes, this one as well lends itself for a lot more than just glass cleaning. It makes cleaning upvc frames very easy due to the difference in trim height. I guess the choice between a full trim or double or dual trim brushes will greatly depend on the user preference and the material worked on.
So how did it cope with the windows it was used on?
Cleaning frames was a breeze with good scrubbing power, but also very quick to glide across the frames and cross bars, hence very little drag was experienced, and the overall speed increased and fatigue decreased.
On the glass side, the brush glides even more easily over the glass then the over UPVC and showed excellent stability, splay and scrubbing performance. Not much folding over of the bristles because of the 15 degree splay.
If anything I found hydrophobic windows easier and quicker to clean because the water could be nicely guided down the glass on severely hydrophobic glass. Due to the slowdown of water in the flocked brushes, the water curtain on hydrophilic glass seemed to slow down quite a bit more then with a mono filament brush. Georgian panes are not much trouble with less resistance felt then on my mono brushes, so again more pleasurable to use. I’ve found the same to be true on leaded lights, traditional and stick on.
Sash windows again are no problems, and with the nice splay of the brush it really helps getting into the corners.
Keeping all these factors of brush engineering and manufacturing in mind when creating the ultimate window cleaning brush is no small feat indeed, and I think over the years Gardiner pole systems have shown to really excel in this field. They deliver consistent product updates with many improvements. Customer feedback seems to be taken on board whenever revisions are made to make sure the customer is pleased.
To sum up things, I think this brush is excellent value for money. When keeping rinsing with the brush on in mind, I do not think it’s a brush that can easily be used by beginners.
If rinsing with the brush on is preferred, I think for many, a mono brush would be a better starter brush. As long as a brush limitations are kept in mind this brush can be used on a variety of surfaces, and with a variety of cleaning techniques. Because people just starting out with a wfp system often find it a very steep learning curve with lots to keep in mind, I think this might be more of a brush for the advanced user. Again I guess this will greatly depend on what you will use the brush for. In my view this brush needs a bit more attention in use then a standard monofilament brush.
This brush will now be one of the few brushes I take with me, and have proven to be an excellent addition to my arsenal of brushes.
now that's a review.
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Some good points tim. In some ways more of a disscusion than a reveiw. I agree with your general points.Rinseing on is a must, there is a difference between soluble and non soluble dirt.Weighing the brushes wet was very switched on.
Gardiners are proactive in pushing things forward.The fault i always find in their thinking is that they are not very domestic focussed.
The part of the review i didn't understand was the flocked bristles gliding rather than skidding.Where is the factual basis for this? Or is it more of an opinion, a suggestion maybe, or something you've heard elsewhere and repeated?
I will say that this is the best product review i've seen on here.
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how much are these wonder brushes
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whats the web address for gardiners ive lost it
thanks
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My dual trim brush curled up in a horrible manner and became unusable, so i can be forgiven for thinking this particular brush is rubbish.
I've seen a few go like that. I think its something they've changed now as they mention improved bristles.
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I thought it would be a good idea to thoroughly do a review on this brush for anyone who is looking to buy one of these brushes. I hope it gives you a decent idea of what the brush is like.
Gardiner Pole Systems Superlite Dual Trim Flocked 15 degrees splay review
(http://www.gardinerpolesystems.co.uk/acatalog/Super-Lite_Flocked_nosocket_250.jpg)
When testing out this brush I’ve asked myself the question whether there is such a thing as a perfect WFP brush.
Most window cleaners use the water fed pole system for more than just cleaning windows, so the ideal brush should be able to be good at more than one cleaning aspect.
I don’t think there is a brush that does 100% of everything you ask it from it, but I do think there are a number of factors that make up a great WFP brush.
In my opinion the following qualities should be expected from a great brush, in no particular order:
- Lightness.
- Little water retention.
- Ease of use, i.e. easy splay without needing unnecessary pressure to clean.
- Scrubbing Power.
- Little dirt retention.
- Ability to rinse on the glass safely.
- Dual trim or Full trim depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Flocked or Mono filament depending on material worked on and/or personal preference.
- Jet spacing/placement.
- Brush stock overhang (how much the brush stock continues after the bristles stop).
- No stiffness or skipping over glass.
(- Brush size)
So how does the Gardiner Pole Systems brush perform when taking these factors in consideration?
99% of all my work is just cleaning windows and upvc, so this summary is focussed more on those areas than anything else, but should hopefully give you a good impression on how the brush performs.
Let’s quickly just list here the types of windows most window cleaners will clean during typical residential and commercial work, and further down I will explain how this brush performs when used on these windows.
- Types of frames encountered: upvc, aluminium, painted.
- Plain sheets of float glass, hydrophobic and hydrophilic.
- Georgian panes subcategorized in either painted, individually placed in upvc, or stick on upvc.
- Leaded lights.
- Stick on leaded windows.
- Sash windows.
In my work, I would ideally like a single brush that offers great cleaning power, with the ability to rinse on safely and also needs to have great ease of use, so it doesn’t make you too tired or even annoyed.
A good place to start with any brush is to just inspect it without using it on the glass, and quickly look at some of the obvious qualities and downfalls of a particular brush.
The (abbreviated GPSSDTF15DS!) brush itself comes with a black 260mm wide stock, which is quite a good residential size, and is fitted with 2 2mm pencil jets spaced 5.5cm or so from the end of the stock.
The screw thread socket seems to be a much improved model from the first generation brushes and seems to be much sturdier and also a much stronger, thicker thread. It should be much more resilient and preventing the dreaded swivelling of a well used brush. Still, like any other brush, it will mostly depend on how often you change brush heads.
The brush really is a lightweight, weighing only 250 grams. It should be an eye opener for people using heavy brushes, especially Vikan owners. But it should even surprise people who aren’t using heavy weight brushes.
The brush design is of the Dual Trim nature, where the inner trim is shorter than the outer trim. When the outer trim splays, the stiffer inner bristles engage and provide even more scrubbing power. Furthermore, the brush is semi flocked, meaning that the outer trim is the only part of the bristle trim that is flocked. The inner trim is completely made up of non flocked monofilament bristles.
Interestingly, the flocked outer bristles aren’t as flocked as let’s say a Vikan. Semi flocked in more than one way indeed.
What’s the reasoning and technical importance behind flocked brushes?
The main difference is the way that flocked bristle ends interact with the glass surface. Monofilaments tend to skid across the surface of the glass which means that they have to have more scrubbing pressure applied to fully clean the surface. Flocked filaments, due to their softer ends, glide across the glass surface covering a greater area per bristle. This means that they tend to clean the glass more effectively with less pressure.
The inner trim, like most Gardiner Pole Systems Dual Trim brushes, isn’t that well populated with bristles. There is a large gap around the pencil jets, most probably so people can easily fit fanjets without having to remove any bristles themselves. Whether this impacts the scrubbing power of the brush is a question that will probably remain unanswered, but I think it would be a good to see a more populated inner trim to maximize scrubbing power and area covered.
The bristles seem nice and soft, and when trying it out on a flat surface, the brush splays very nicely without much effort needed. This should be good!
Impressions when in use
Like with a lot of things, first impressions count, and boy does this brush deliver!
This brush really brought a smile on my face. I’ve had been using a 10” Aquafactors Dual Trim brush (similar to a Tucker) for some time, which ultimately, after some modifying, weighed in at about 400 grams. To go straight to a lightweight brush like this is such a great experience. It really seems that in feel and ease of use alone, you lose about 1Kg for every 100g shed of a WFP brush!
The drop in weight makes the whole brush and pole assembly (if combined with a light carbon fibre pole) a precision tool. It easily allows you to place the brush exactly where you want it to go, without any strain in your back muscles or arms. You can really whip the pole about with seemingly little to no effort at all. Of course that is partially because of me using an SL-X, but you should see a great improvement even on fibreglass poles, or any other carbon fibre pole for that matter.
A second first impression (?) I had was the ease of use it delivered. I’m not sure if some of you have noticed the same thing, but I really dislike a brush that needs a lot of force to splay. Especially with Dual Trim brushes, where it’s quite essential that the inner trim engages properly. This brush does seem to melt very nicely on the glass, and splays without much effort at all. Little to no energy is wasted in this way. Every bit helps when you are doing a lot of repetitive work.
Scrubbing power for a brush this size and weight, with relatively few bristles is actually very impressive. Compared to the aforementioned Aquafactors brush, it is virtually on par. It is even more impressive if you solely look at how many bristles a Tucker/Aquafactors brush has, and then compare it to the brush reviewed.
First cleans on upvc and glass do show great scrubbing power, the same counts for any other material found on the glass apart from typical dirt. Bird muck just flies off without any soaking and insect dropping and the like need little scrubbing to come off as well. Idem ditto for snail trails.
A light brush ideally needs to be kept light. 50ml of water is 50gram. So if your brush retains a lot of water it really can weigh the brush down. Luckily this brush does not retain much water at all. It seems to retain a little bit more than a monofilament brush, but overall, not too much of a problem.
What I found most interesting is the water retention comparison I made between a Superlite Mono (Mark1) and this brush. For this simple test I weighed the brushes when completely dry, and then weighed them after submersing them in a bucket of water, taking it out, and tilting the brush several time till it stopped dripping. No shaking of the brush was done. Just letting the excess of water run away. The test was repeated twice and the average was taken.
The Superlite Mono weighed in 293g dry. And wet it was 363g. A difference of 70 grams.
The Superlite Flocked as reviewed here weighed in 289g dry. It was 335g wet. A difference of 46g.
So what we can see here is that between these two brushes a difference of 24 grams existed. I was convinced the flocked brush would weigh more when wet. But I was proven wrong. 24 grams isn’t much, but every little helps I guess.
So a flocked brush is the standard by default then? It sounds great?!
Well, yes and no. In my humble opinion, the only way to properly use a water fed pole day in day out is to rinse with the brush on. This greatly reduces fatigue and strain. You wouldn’t lift off at 60ft, so there really shouldn’t be any point in lifting off at 14ft or lower. This is where brush choice comes in.
Due to the inherent nature of a flocked brush, it holds on to quite a lot more dirt then standard non flocked brushes. On regular maintenance cleans, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem, but even on regular work, you can pick up a lot of dirt from sills etc. So on more dirty work you will see a lot more dirt retained in the brush. If you go from side to side on a cross-section of upvc, bits of dirt will keep coming out quite a bit longer then a monofilament brush.
Does this matter when rinsing on with the brush? Logically one would seem to think so. But on regular, not too dirty cleans I have found that the finish is just as good when rinsing with the brush on.
My opinion on this is that there is a difference between non soluble dirt and soluble dirt. The bits that you see in the brush and cobwebs etc, don’t seem to make much of a difference in spotting. Remember that spotting occurs because of dissolved dirt that dries up in spots.
So I believe there is more to it then you would first think.
Water flow through the brush is then most important, so that dissolved dirt can make its way through the brush and then rinse down the window. A steady 2lpm or more from the brushhead is ideal when rinsing with the brush on, but brush design is equally important.
What you can see with the Superlite Dual Trim Flocked is that water does seem to slow down quite a bit as opposed to a monofilament brush. This requires a slight slowdown in rinsing, to make sure the water can make its way through, carrying the dirt along with it.
This, in my opinion, is the reason why you can use a flocked brush on regular maintenance cleans. It’s therefore not a beginner’s brush, since there are several things to look out for, and technique needs to be adjusted on a window to window basis.
As with all Dual Trim brushes, this one as well lends itself for a lot more than just glass cleaning. It makes cleaning upvc frames very easy due to the difference in trim height. I guess the choice between a full trim or double or dual trim brushes will greatly depend on the user preference and the material worked on.
So how did it cope with the windows it was used on?
Cleaning frames was a breeze with good scrubbing power, but also very quick to glide across the frames and cross bars, hence very little drag was experienced, and the overall speed increased and fatigue decreased.
On the glass side, the brush glides even more easily over the glass then the over UPVC and showed excellent stability, splay and scrubbing performance. Not much folding over of the bristles because of the 15 degree splay.
If anything I found hydrophobic windows easier and quicker to clean because the water could be nicely guided down the glass on severely hydrophobic glass. Due to the slowdown of water in the flocked brushes, the water curtain on hydrophilic glass seemed to slow down quite a bit more then with a mono filament brush. Georgian panes are not much trouble with less resistance felt then on my mono brushes, so again more pleasurable to use. I’ve found the same to be true on leaded lights, traditional and stick on.
Sash windows again are no problems, and with the nice splay of the brush it really helps getting into the corners.
Keeping all these factors of brush engineering and manufacturing in mind when creating the ultimate window cleaning brush is no small feat indeed, and I think over the years Gardiner pole systems have shown to really excel in this field. They deliver consistent product updates with many improvements. Customer feedback seems to be taken on board whenever revisions are made to make sure the customer is pleased.
To sum up things, I think this brush is excellent value for money. When keeping rinsing with the brush on in mind, I do not think it’s a brush that can easily be used by beginners.
If rinsing with the brush on is preferred, I think for many, a mono brush would be a better starter brush. As long as a brush limitations are kept in mind this brush can be used on a variety of surfaces, and with a variety of cleaning techniques. Because people just starting out with a wfp system often find it a very steep learning curve with lots to keep in mind, I think this might be more of a brush for the advanced user. Again I guess this will greatly depend on what you will use the brush for. In my view this brush needs a bit more attention in use then a standard monofilament brush.
This brush will now be one of the few brushes I take with me, and have proven to be an excellent addition to my arsenal of brushes.
Excactly what I was goona say Tim!!!! ;D
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Such an outstanding review deserves better by way of replies.The main comments seem to be about the lenght and depth of tim's appraisal.Will anyone else bother to go so in depth if the likelyhood of any informed feedback is unlikely?
I think he was fairly even handed, put a great deal of thought into it, and displayed excellent background knowledge.
I use gardiners supalite mono trim brushes with white bristles.I think it was edd on here who made me switch.It was hard to believe that such a light brush could do the job, but they do it very well.Even an xtel pole becomes a lot easier with one of these on the end.I have fans fitted, and using a heavy flow and warmish water i can work at speed with minimal effort.
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yes it was a good review but come on!!its just a brush for cleaning windows!!he takes the word "anorak" to a whole new level!! ;) ;D ;D ;D
nothing else to say as its already been said!! ;) ;D ;D ;D
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Dazmond- even three years ago our job was very different because the poles were so cumbersome and the brushes were for washing vans not windows.You come along,. go wfp and never give your brilliant kti a second thought.The ionics stuff was pretty good if you coiuld afford it, but for the rest of us you had to be a weight lifter.A pole going over a cons horizontal at thirty foot with a heavy brush is probably something you will never know, and believe me you wouldn't want to.
Thanks to anoraks such as tim, jeff brimble, alex gardiner, luke (rupert the hair, remember him?) you have fabulous and ever improving kit.Get some work at 60' and then say it's just a brush, start caning your domestic round and need to put the hammer down and then say it's just a brush.
High end earners use high end kit.It's about lightness and usability, but ultimatley it's about money, and i think you'll find there are quite a few money anoraks
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i agree with dazmond their just brushes
important factors missed for any window cleaning brush is
light weight sill brush & scraper, only the aerial brush has these features
most important factor is how much quick a brush cleans
and nothing cleans as fast as the aerial brushes for window cleaning
if you want a conser roof brush use the tucker brush with the scraper attacments from tecbuk
fantastic and again very very quick, and no possible damage to the roof with the aerial scraper
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/RS-Window-Cleaning/Brush-Parts-Components-/_i.html?_fsub=2038164013&_sid=1024716733&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322
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i agree with dazmond their just brushes
important factors missed for any window cleaning brush is
light weight sill brush & scraper, only the aerial brush has these features
most important factor is how much quick a brush cleans
and nothing cleans as fast as the aerial brushes for window cleaning
if you want a conser roof brush use the tucker brush with the scraper attacments from tecbuk
fantastic and again very very quick, and no possible damage to the roof with the aerial scraper
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/RS-Window-Cleaning/Brush-Parts-Components-/_i.html?_fsub=2038164013&_sid=1024716733&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322
The only thing is- the Aerial brush is so ridiculously over splayed & over priced. Ok if you want to clean the brickwork as well as the windows ::) Oh, & Gardiners Xtreme also has a scraper! ;D
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i agree with dazmond their just brushes
important factors missed for any window cleaning brush is
light weight sill brush & scraper, only the aerial brush has these features
most important factor is how much quick a brush cleans
and nothing cleans as fast as the aerial brushes for window cleaning
if you want a conser roof brush use the tucker brush with the scraper attacments from tecbuk
fantastic and again very very quick, and no possible damage to the roof with the aerial scraper
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/RS-Window-Cleaning/Brush-Parts-Components-/_i.html?_fsub=2038164013&_sid=1024716733&_trksid=p4634.c0.m322
The only thing is- the Aerial brush is so ridiculously over splayed & over priced. Ok if you want to clean the brickwork as well as the windows ::) Oh, & Gardiners Xtreme also has a scraper! ;D
I wouldn't agree with Alexs statement that a brush needs to scrub sills and have a scraper. Once you go so high there is only so much sill scrubbing you can do, you can't see it all anyway, and most dirt runs out of the join between the sill and the frame so no matter how clean you scrubbed it you can't stop crap running out of it and leaving it dirty. That sort of negates scrubbing it, unless you're gonna get up with a ladder and wipe it off?
Do you need a scraper on the back of a brush? I'd doubt it, each to their own.
Prices do work out similar though. Roughly..43 plus 3 postage for the Ariel brush. My gardiners cost me 45 with VAT and postage. Not a lot price wise in them.