Clean It Up
UK Floor Cleaning Forum => Carpet Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: dustee on August 20, 2015, 09:49:50 pm
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Dry sponges or encap for domestic and also commercial , what is / would be the most effective
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The most effective would be the best system for the circumstances, on domestics you need a good twin vac extractor as you won't touch half the carpets you'll encounter with the others, especially Dry Compound.
Simon
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I only ever used sponges once to see if they worked.... I was not impressed. in fact I think I still have the tub with the second pack in it unopened...
Possibly on sisal but even then, don't expect much of a good result.
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Ive been getting a few jobs recently from customers that have previously used a dry compound guy. Advertising 'dry cleaning', except that he pre sprays trafic lanes first. That's a bit naughty, selling it as dry cleaning then explaining that he'll have to wet some of of the area. in other words 'Wet Cleaning'.
Dave.
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is that the ZERO DRYING TIME guy dave?
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is that the ZERO DRYING TIME guy dave?
Yes, he gives jobs to me too - nice guy that Zero fella😃
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Ok so that rules out sponges so is encap suitable ?
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yes Simon, since this guy has been in town demand for a "proper" clean has gone up a lot, hope he keeps going cause its great for business
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I think u are suppose to prespray in many cases , as in host has its own range of presprays which are mostly just detergent when i look it up .
I use host powder ( occasionally ) i prespray or mist with citrus prespray when appropriate , the host powder smells good anyway , often customers comment on that .
It can be messy in my limited experience , the stuff gets everywhere , on your gear etc .
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Ok so that rules out sponges so is encap suitable ?
Encap is suitable in certain commercial situations, but not suitable for domestics as you are leaving nasty residues in the carpet which could be harmful, or so I'm told by people who know more than I do about these things.
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Have never rated sponges, encap works well on commercial I did try it on my own carpet as a test.
Initial thought was wow this is great......3 months later I was getting worried as carpet didnt look great 8 months on and it needs cleaning properly with proper extraction.
Commercial it is a no brainer and imo domestic it is a no starter.
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Well i use encap 95% of the time and work 5 to 6 days aweek, plus work for 5 estate agents and they love it , dry in about a hour plus loads of repeat from my customer bank , so every body to there own ,
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So do you wait in the job till the carpet dries and then post vac the residues out?
Simon
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no i ask the customer and explain ,they are more than happy with the results and dry in a hour so every body happy .
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But you haven't actually taken anything out of the carpet. Perhaps the domestic customer might vacuum the carpet, but the eot's won't and don't even know that they have to because they aren't there, so how have you cleaned the carpets?
From my perspective I would not dream of encapping 95% of or any domestic carpets because I believe that it is our job as professionals to get customers carpets as clean as possible and encapping just doesn't fit the bill in that respect. No argument that if you encap a carpet it will look cleaner, but that is not the same it being clean, which is what the customer is paying for.
Can I ask why you choose encap for these jobs and not extraction cleaning?
Simon
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The usual comments coming from customers that have used the Dry Compound system in the past is " I just didn't feel that it had been cleaned."
Many years ago when a very large Franchise was 'Dry Foam' shampooing carpets, that required post vacuuming to supposedly remove the soil that had become trapped in crystals (sound familiar?) a couple of their operatives attended a carpet cleaning course that I was on. I wondered why they were there, as this course concentrated on HWE machinery. Their reply was that they were fed up of customers asking where the soil had gone and were trying to get out of the Franchise.
Dave.
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Well Mr Gerrard that is a very bold satement , the system, vac, spray, tm4, vac again , bonnet, there is loads of rubbish comming out from the bottom of the pile , then again i could use a sebo like a lot of carpet cleaners and leave most of the dirt in the bottom of the carpet, come on Hector help me out here , has i said each carpet cleaner to his system , going for a pint now love you all even the tm lads.
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the system, vac, spray, tm4, vac again , bonnet
So you're vaccing damp carpet?
And surely you are missing out the most important bit, post vaccing.
I'm not having a go at you, if you think that is carpet cleaning acceptable in 95% of cases then so be it.
Simon
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First Impressions do you have an email addy / phone number so as to pick your brains
jim
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After trying all the different methods available it is clear that there is no simple cheap option. Hot water extraction is the most effective method in 90% of cases. The other methods are available to solve problems. A good carpet cleaner will try to have them all at hand if the need arises.
Relying on one method is like being a carpenter who only uses a saw and no other tools.
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Well Mr Gerrard that is a very bold satement , the system, vac, spray, tm4, vac again , bonnet, there is loads of rubbish comming out from the bottom of the pile , then again i could use a sebo like a lot of carpet cleaners and leave most of the dirt in the bottom of the carpet, come on Hector help me out here , has i said each carpet cleaner to his system , going for a pint now love you all even the tm lads.
Sorry, not getting involved here..... I am retired!! ;D ;D
I have had my arguments with Simon on here in the past, but have stood my ground and had the courage of my convictions and proved myself correct.... But I didn't just encap, and didn't just LM, I combined all sorts of methods, but still remained Low Moisture.....
However..... I always bonnetted my encap cleaning at the end so that I didn't leave residue in the custards house, as they NEVER vacuum when it is dry, but leave it a few days to make sure... by which time it has been a waste of time cleaning it in the first place IMHO.. ;D
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It's not that I am against encapping, I've got all the gear for both LM and encap, Cimex R48, rotaries, pads, brushes, chemicals etc.
But I also have a whole range of other equipment and tools, a TM, portable extractor, the means to agitate with both brush and pad, the means to scrub small areas with a Minitex and a wide range of chemicals.
From my perspective, it is our mission to arrive at a job with the means to clean any carpet, regardless of age or condition and to choose from the available options the best system or technique to get that carpet, not just nearly clean, but really clean. So I could not imagine having only an encap system available to me because I would be selling both myself and more importantly the customer short in terms of producing the best possible result - but that is just me.
Are there top class exponents of LM, you bet there are, Hector being a prime example of that.
What seems absurd to me is that the part the whole encap system relies on, removing the encapsulated soil when the carpet is dry, is missed and passed onto the customer, who may or may not do it and even if they do may not do it properly, leaving potentially harmful residues in the carpet and as Hector says, that makes cleaning it a complete waste of time.
Let's not forget, our number one goal as business people is to have the clients we serve come to see us as, 'their carpet cleaner,' and we do that by the quality of the work we do and the level of service we provide to them, so that we can build a successful business for the long term.
Simon
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Last year I cleaned some offices including 2 flights of stairs and landings, I encapped the offices and had I helper use the TM on the stairs & landing.
The second day we returned and could see a big difference between the 2 areas, although the office looked massively cleaner when you opened the door between the office and the landing it was the same difference again, if we had not used the TM We would have walked away patting ourselves on the back for doing such a great job.
I have had the same thing happen using a spotting machine on domestics I tried bonneting homes but had I disagreeistant walk around and remove bad stains with the spotter, again we could had difficulty blending in the very clean spotted area with the rest of the carpet.
All LM cleaning will do a good job but it's hard to make a direct comparison without a side by side clean, it will make a carpet 'cleaner' but not 'clean'
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https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=bonnet+cleaning+vs+truckmount&FORM=HDRSC3#view=detail&mid=0E736330FA6D6A41EF890E736330FA6D6A41EF89
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What would be the best pre-spray for sponges
Or a micro splitter
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Craftex Multisolve is an excellent pre-spray for this method.
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John do you sell the dry compound ( sponges ) if so at what price
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We do the Craftex and Chemspec ones they are on our website.
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personally I like the ones you get in the bottom of those birds triffles..
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Well i use encap 95% of the time and work 5 to 6 days aweek, plus work for 5 estate agents and they love it , dry in about a hour plus loads of repeat from my customer bank , so every body to there own ,
I'm with you on this one. We always pre-vac, spray down with dynamall, let it dwell for a short time, then bonnet.
Every time we go to a job, if we can bonnet we will (most of all our commercial is encap with fantastic results, never had one issue).
Don't get me wrong, some carpets we will need to hwe, but most jobs encap. Never had one complaint either from letting agent/property management company or the tenant.
If we need to spot clean before, we will, but encap if used correctly does give fantastic results. Every method of cleaning has its time and place depending on how bad/carpet type is.
I never rule our hwe but if we can encap we will. As for asking the custy to vac after once the carpet has dried, we always explain to the the custy before hand (what method of cleaning, what to expect from the clean and about vacuuming after the clean). Never any issues.
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Never really got into dry compound as my experiments using my Ashbys power brush at home have not been successful so I put it down to not having a host. or similar machine.
Then I read a Paul Pierce post great he is on here after all these years..saying it is possible to have success using a hard brush.
So was my failure the equipment sponges or it is just a useless system for a dirty carpet,