Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: robbie14000 on April 11, 2007, 08:03:14 pm
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Hi, I have been WFP now for well over 2 years and it,s starting to p*ss me off.
When I started i never ever got complaints ever.
Got home tonight after a 10 hour day and had 2 complaints on my phone.
Spots,spots,spots.
I backwashed my van at the weekend, changed the filters, the resin was changed last month so do not know what is going on.
Could there be anything else???
I concentrate on delivering quality to all my clients and do well but leaving jobs with windows wet and not knowing how they are going to come out I don,t like.
I am very tempted to go back to traditional methods for my domestic customers and just explain to them and put their prices up a couple of ££.
Do you lot have the same problems???
I love my work but am hellbent on delivering quality.
Thanks(rant now over)
Robbie -Clearshine
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dont clean the top frame or any vents, problem solved :)
tony
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Investigate the alleged spots !!!
Some customers look through their windows, see spots and assume they are on the outside, they could be on the inside.
Without investigation, you won't find out what is causing it.
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Going back to see them 2morrow.
I don,t clean any vents or tops of whites.
I do now carry my poles on the outside of the van in poleholders.
Could this cause problems
Thanks Robbie- Clearshine
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Investigate the alleged spots !!!
Some customers look through their windows, see spots and assume they are on the outside, they could be on the inside.
Without investigation, you won't find out what is causing it.
Good advice. I've checked out two complaints in the past few years and both were nothing to do with me; one was inside spots and the other was spots between the double-glazing.
Also, Robbie, how many complaints have you had regarding your WFP over the past two years you've been using it; and how many jobs do you estimate you've cleaned over that time.
For example if you've had five complaints in two years, yet clean 300 accounts per month, that's not bad going is it. So, using this example, if you've had five complaints from 7,200 cleans; then that's okay; isn't it?
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You dont clean the tops of the frames?? Do you clean the sides??
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For peace of mind check your TDS on the water from your hose. If that's fine then it's down to your method or a customer mistaking spots inside for outside.
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Are you sure there not just listening to hearsay,maybe the neighbours have been slagging it off to them and it`s taken this long for them to react.You`ll most likly find it`s there freinds wcs that have been slagging it off due to jealousy,loads of trad wcs slag off the pole and because there so called wcs certain people will listen,don`t forget people are going to think why hasn`t my wc got one they must be rubbish.
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Is it a new customer or one you have had for a while?
I got one problem house (good job it's my parents) where there are loads of runs of white spots however much I scrub/rinse.
Trial and error by cleaning up the window in stages and I have finally found the problem....its the rubber seals around the glass, now I have even scrubbed these with pure and gg3 with a hand brush and still spots spots spots.
Due to the amount of times I have cleaned these windows I'd have to say under the rubbers must be clean :-\ only other reason could be the rubbers themselves deteoriating, I will try to find replacements and see how they go.
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I had a phonecall yesterday saying I cracked a bathroom window!
"Well it was fine before you came, and cracked after!"
Me: "I use a thin carbon fibre pole with a very soft brush. I think I may just snap my pole before I crack a window" ::)
"Absolutely impossible"
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Sometimes in this warm weather were having i find an extra rinse will stop spotting.
As already said though it might not be you if you've been wfp for that long.
Squeaks if it's a new job, then i always check all the windows when i go and quote and point out any cracks etc to the customer before i take them on.
Craig
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Squeaks if it's a new job, then i always check all the windows when i go and quote and point out any cracks etc to the customer before i take them on.
So do I, but this is one I've been doing for years.
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Must have been where you were a bit careless when using your ladders ;D ;D before you started using wfp.
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This is just a theory so please feel free to rip it to shreds ::)
It could be possible that the air is that much more polluted than it was 2 years ago (global warming and co2 emissions are always in the news).
Obviously the water is pure when it's used. But as it dries it could be attracting the the pollutants in the air.
After all if you throw a handfull of sand at a dry window pane it'll slide off. But if the window was wet the sand would stick.
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A customer said to me ' is there a way to leave them drier, because when it rains it leaves spots'? Huh? Basically, because it leaves spots when it rains she thinks it must with the pole. I checked the results and they were perfect. Most complaints are usually just the customer.
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you need to wash all of the frames all of the time. other wise when you next go to clean it if you have left a bit of dirt on the top and the water hits it .it will run down takeing the dirt with it plus contaminating the water. when i first bought my system the guy told me to leave topsbut i got no end of people moneing.now the only time i might get a mone is the first couple of cleans on a new job.plus you need to have water jets not
fan jets they go every where. i start at the tops go from left to right then start at the bottoms from left to right.if i am doing sash windows i will do the top pane first go to the other window do the top of that then do the bottoms.there are some windows that for some reson just will not work.this one house all of the house is fine apart from 2 windows that will spot every time these are ground floor windows so i still clean it with the pole then after i put the pole away i just go back with the squeegee takes 1 min. to me if you get the odd job that it does not work on then i think i would rather give it up. i mean if its happening all the time then there is a bigger problem.loseing the odd job every once in a while is not to bad but its if you are loseing a lot when it becomes a problem.wfp save a lot of time and you can do a good 25-35% extra a day ;)
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i think its just something we have to accept i have found some customers really analyse the job others are just happy to find a window cleaner its all the retired at home all day folks who are the most critical of the wfp they don't have anything else to do but check your work the best customers are the ones who are out at work all day. (they don't get time to even look at the job. i try to have the philosophy of it's all money and bit by bit you get the cusotmers you really want. my comments are based on 5 years of wfp and its slowly but surely that i have found the right customers just don't give up. i had one call me today i went straight back and she was trying to show me the spots i wish i had had a magnifying glass cause they were that small then she asked me how long i normally took to clean the windows. i knew immediately with that comment i will lose her but she will pay me for a few months yet. thats life went to one of my commercial jobs after her and doubled up the value of the work and on to a referred person from an existing customer and even higher value. so remember wfp is here to stay the public just have to get there head around it.
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No you dont need to wash all of the frames all of the time, at the top of the frame there is always something else be it more pvc, brickwork, etc, so where do you actually stop!!!
Macmac I think it was who said leave the top frame and I argued against, but it was one of the best pieces of advice for me so far, still dont make things perfect but certainlt cuts down on the problems ;D
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WFP is a fantastic tool, and it can do a top rate job, no question on that....
However; It isn't as consistant as trad, when you walk away from a window you have cleaned trad you know exactly the kind of job you have done (mostly)
There is always a greater risk of getting it wrong with WFP, once you are a skilled and experienced user you will reduce that risk but there will always be the odd window or account you can't get right.
I currently use the lightest pole set up on the market (superlite + superlite brush) fabulous in use, but the downside is that it is fragile.
There is always a balancing charge!
Trad will leave you far more tired at the end of the day, it is way more dangerous to work off a ladder, ladders can damage sills amd mark walls, scrims will leave smears, squeegees can leave lines and kicks and so on and so forth.
So although you can acheive far more consistant results working trad, it isn't without its downsides.
Sometimes the problem with spots may be windy weather and nearby shrubbery or trees, it may be the rubber seals on the windows, it might be oxidised frames, and sometimes, no matter what you do, particular windows will just never be right :-\
And equally often, the problem is the customer! :o
I personally refuse point blank to use my ladder other than for access, problems with downstairs windows? Then I'll use WFP on them, and then nip back over them with a squeegee.
This isn't as bad as it sounds, you don't have to detail or worry too much about technique, after all, there isn't much on the glass to leave marks because you have already cleaned them with pure water.
Upstairs the customers is told live with it or get another window cleaner (but not that bluntly!).
Ian
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I find that as long as I rinse sufficiently - ie a lot, the only problems I have are when the droplets dry on the glass leaving a dust spot.
I put this down to dust on the wind which is drawn to wet droplets and when dry sticks out like a sore thumb - a pain in the neck!
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John I dont think they are "dust" spots I live in a very rural area and even on calm days or at night in low humidity, the phobic glass can still dry spotty.
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Like you I too live in a rural area and recently the farmers have been grass cutting and turning over the fields so there is a lot of dust everywhere so much so that on windows I did early this week the sills are covered with dust already.
I am intrigued by the phobic glass reference though. Do you believe dust spots appear more on this type of glass - and by phobic - is that the stuff that does not sheet because I notice the dust spots do appear more on the non-sheeting type of glass.
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I understand about the "farmers" dust but its not the norm. As a generalisation I dont think the droplets of water do absorb enough mineral (tds)dust from the air to make the spots that give us the problems on Hydrophobic glass.
The Hydrohillic (water loving)sheeting glass gives no problems and is quicker to clean using 1/3rd less water on regulary cleaned windows.
Yes the problems are always with the droplet forming hphobic glass. However after many years I am still at a loss as to what causes it, except to guess as I mentioned earlier that maybe the water is not filtered enogh. If there is zero wind where do the milky white spots come from ?
Note that the phobic glass breaks down into 2 further types- one that tends not to spot and one that does.
I remeber some years ago when I started that there was one paticular series of anticyclones that where picking up dust from the Saharh and also Spain, It nearly drove me bonkers because the glass and cars literally overnight had a thick deposit of this yellow and orange sand that turned to a milky paste much like the farmers dust you refered to, the resulting "soup" took several cleans to remove, and just when I got around my round another anticyclone came along and did it all over again.
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Jeff, in my post further up, when I clean just the glass its ok, if I go up another 10mm and include the rubber then the dreaded white spots appear--- loads of em, even after numerous cleans :o
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yes ok Jeff, I'm sorry but we seem to be talking at cross purposes here.
Whichever glass I am on - sheeting glass leaves droplets as well - droplets form that once dry form perfect droplet shapes made entirely of dust. You can put paper on them and they transfer as shapes made of dust.
Spots to me are different. They are just spots, nasty little gritty critturs that take a hell of a lot of rinsing down and I think they come out of the edge beading of the windows.
But it is funny I have not noticed white spots.
Oh, and I dont mind warm weather but I prefer not having the Sahara dust storms back again!
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If spots are left in a vertical line, then its due to the rubber seals not being watertight.
If their are a few splattered around at the top of the window then you have contaminted your brush breifly.
Some customers sometimes complain of spots whilst the window is still wet.
And some frames or windows just dont like wfp.
Nel.
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Just see it as a wake up call.
I got complacent and speeded up , therefore I left spots.
I slowed down and now the spots are gone.
Now the bad weather has gone and the sun is out , it is now time to slow down.
Dave
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Aye Dave, its a bit like the Tortoise and the Hare story.
Its sooo easy to go too fast. The pole almost demonically takes over your personality and commands you to go faster. :o
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Dave
I have gone the other way round. I was a lot slower cleaning the windows in winter due to the glass being covered in salt. I scrubbed the windows twice then did a double rinse, I had no complaints about spots.
Now the salt as gone and the widows are cleaner between cleans I am back to scrubbing once and rinseing once. My speed as shot up as a result.
Nel.
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Its no good just saying spots and leaving it at that. Spots where? which windows? where on the windows? all windows of just some? big spots? small spots? runs?
Put your Sherlock Holmes hat on and look for clues. For example, I find that now I am faster I can be doing the downstairs while water is still dropping or running down from upstairs. This was causing spots and runs on the bottom wondows.
Spots can't come from thin air and they can't come from clean water so the answer is there, you just need to work it out from what it happening.
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Yes you do need to work out where they come from, each house is different. But...
Quote- "Spots can't come from thin air and they can't come from clean water so the answer is there, you just need to work it out from what it happening"
Thin air :) Have been trying for many years to work it out, some (only some) always spot, and I still dont know why ???
A lot is to do with faith..... Beginers and doubters. ??? Clean a window with wfp then blade it so you have a pristine finish. Now squirt some RO/DI water on the glass and watch it dry perfect. Generally proving that its the method and not the water.
But I still dont know why some spot. :)
Mind you thats not quite true I do have clue, Its down to a coating on the glass but what that paticular coating or combination of coatings is.. thats what I dont know.
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I am reliably informed that glass never actually dries, that is why when you look at a pane of glass it reflects that ripple in it
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Its a strange phenomomen it appears hard but is soft not a solid but also not a liquid and still flowing internally, Pilks in St Helens(the canteen I think) have a long pane 26ft installed since the float glass of the late sixties, they measure it periodically. Internally its moving or flowing downwards due to gravity. The top is getting thinner and the bottom is thickening. ???
It holds water but is absorbent. Strange stuff really. 8)
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I agree with Vince that you need to work out why a particular window is spotting, I've worked from the bottom up of a problem window in stages, up the glass to the rubber seal and thats where the problems start, glass itself always ok, get to the seal and loads of runs of white spots so in my case its the seals causing problems