After borrowing a friends 3400psi 4gpm 13hp Honda pressure washer for the weekend, I'm finally convinced I need one. I work construction and it will mainly be used 99% on concrete, but...I'm sure I'll find some other uses for it.

Anyway, I'd always heard that a good one will cost you $1500+, but never wanted to believe it when Lowes or HD had them for $399.

Who makes (and where will I buy it) a reliable GAS pressure washer that is going to last me forever? I'm under the assumption that a Honda engine is the only way to go, correct?

Thanks

http://www.mitm.com/

Sold alot of the belt drives. Good units.

Northerntool has some pretty nice hot pressure washers. Don't get the reman ones though. We have a 4000 psi 4 gpm electric one and it will strip paint if you get too close. We mainly use it for washing off tractors before taking them to a job site.

I have a Northern w/ a Honda 11HP engine and a Cat pump. It rocks. Hard.

My buddies who have Karcher (Honda ppowered) units from Costco like it better than theirs.

Jim

Do you want hot or cold? Hot you are looking at about $3500-$3700, cold you are looking at about $800-$1000. It all depends on how much grease and oil you are trying to cut.

If you intend to have it for a long time, make sure your vendor will support it.

In an earlier life, (back when I had a real job) I had to manage a part of a plant that required use of a pressure washer. Imagine my surprise when I found out that model of a hot pressure washer was considered obsolete. It was still in their catalog yet the mfgr said it was obsolete! Parts were NLA, requiring replacement of the pump after a year of daily use.

McMaster-Carr did not support this $4500 piece of machinery, much to my disappointment.

PT

The other day around Houston a fellow was electrocuted by an electric pressure washer, the only description of what happened was that he was handling the wand...

I wish a more detailed report was available to prevent other accidents like what the cause was and why a short was able to exist without the GFCI throwing. (We have a Northern NorthStar hot water electric pressure washer at work that uses a Kerosene furnace...)

Yep, but they give pretty detailed explanations on how crimes are committed, how to thwart airport security, how to get into the local nuclear power plant...

Yep, but they give pretty detailed explanations on how crimes are committed, how to thwart airport security, how to get into the local nuclear power plant...



isnt that the truth :shaking:

I realize hot water would be best...but is it worth the extra 2k, or will a cold water pressure washer do fine?

If you are stripping grease or oil hot is the ONLY way to go. We can take a tractor that is covered in red grease and oil with no problem in min. We have 230v electric one that works awesome. Haven't been shocked yet. :flipoff2:

and watch your feet...I had a friend cut his big toe off when he was washing in sandals...I think its funny he thinks Im a asshole

If you are stupid enough to be pressure washing with 2000+ psi with sandals on then you desirve it. Kinda like the same people that walk around a machine shop barefoot and then bitch about getting splinters and cuts on the bottom of their feet from the metal shavings.

i bought a troy built 2600 psi at lowe's for $388.it has a 5 HP honda engine and i cleaned concrete with it all day today and it worked great.i first bought the pressure wave 2600 at sam's club,it worked for a week and then took a crap.took it back yesterday and exchanged it for another,that one didn't work right out of the box.got my money back last night and went to lowes.used the try built all day today and had no problems.hot is nice but not necessary for concrete.

We have a Hotsy at work which is excellent, but pricey as well.

I'm looking for a cold water model. The hot water would be nice, but I can't justify the cost AND I need this thing to be portable. The few hot water pressure washers I've seen have been rather bulky. I need one I can throw in the back of the truck and take to the job.

Thanks for the great replies.

Go to lowes or home depot, I've had two of there power washers. The honda 13 hp, 3700 psi one works really well. I've used my two for the last three years, not problems. Should cost 1000 bucks.

Peter

For a poor mans hotsy, you can hook up to your HW heater. You can even raise them temp as long as you live alone or tape all the faucets in the house off so no one gets fried!

I've been happy with my Costco washer. I bought the model with the Briggs motor because it had slightly more HP than the Honda. It works great for me.

Of course a hot one would be nice, but unless you are making money off of the darn thing, its a little hard to justify. Heck, at my work the 18 wheelers get washed off with a (considerably more powerful 3-plase) cold washer and it works fine.

We have a Hotsy at work which is excellent, but pricey as well.

I replaced our 15 year old Hotsy with a newer used Hotsy from the dealer, only paid $1500 for a 3 year old machine with brand new pump and motor and 3 year old heating coil. Brand new was $3K for 2.2/3000 and warranty - I figured I could buy a coil for $1K and still save myself $500 bucks. We never had anything go wrong with our 15 year old machine until it completely wore out all at once. Can't go wrong with a Hotsy but some of the more expensive Northern Star washers are pretty nice too.

You should check with your Hotsy dealer, they probably do the same thing with trades and re-worked units.

at our work, we only use honda engines. For a 3000 psi, a 11hp or 13hp will be fine. Hondas are very easy to work on, servicing is a breeze, parts are redily avialable and compared to briggs, they are the only small engine. For pumps, we use triplex pumps. Work great, simple design and can be tweaked to 3500. A tip can make a big difference, if you are looking to clean concrete, a 3000 with a turbo tip ( a tip that has a porcelain bearing in it that moves around, creating a circular spray) will be more than enough.

A good propram going is the opti-4. If it a oil that will double your engine warrenty FREE if you buy a case of it, and use it exclusively in the engione. Get this if you can, its about 130% more expensive than cheap 10-30, but comes with the warrenty.

we run landa washers with honda engines at work. we've had the hondas throw rods before the landa pumps give up the ghost.

hondas may be easy to service in general but have fun replacing the governer springs since they mount them under those big bulky tanks. much easier with a briggs :p

Honda's also use a lot less fuel, have oil-alert( if your oil is too low it will automatically shut off to prevent damage,) has the opti-4 thing i mentioned before, better design, easier to work on. Ever since our shop swtiched over from all briggs to all hondas, there has been a lot less work-orders. Also, honda parts are fairly consitantly the same throughout the 5.5-13hp engines, brigg's changes from evey power level.

As for the gov. spring, yes they are vulnerable, but honda engines have very little flaws compared to briggs.



Briggs = :evil: