Wondering if anyone has a chemical or process for cleaning really neglected windows like this. The seals ooze out this gunk onto the glass over time. Really gross, and gums up my scrapers quickly.
At my current pace, this two day job is gonna take all week, lol.
If anyone has any trade secrets or out-of-the-box ideas to share, feel free to call or text me. 8023809036
Tried steel wool or oil flo?
I’ve had one house from memory like that (Andersons) and I wet the window, steel wooled, and hucked the edges. Came out pretty good.
Thanks for the tip. Whatever this stuff is, is thick. Fresh razor every 3 or 4 windows seems to be the best approach from a traditional standpoint
But I think I’ve come up with a viable alternative. I ran to the hardware store and got about 32 feet of 5/16” vinyl tubing. Connected one end to the unused pencil jets of my tucker brush, and the other end hooked right up to my pump sprayer.
I put OneRestore in the pump sprayer. Squeeze the sprayer trigger for a few seconds to get some solution on the glass, and then scrub real good. The gunk is melting off. Then I rinse with pure water.
I’ve been wanting to setup a dual hose wfp for awhile now. It’s a little cumbersome and definitely more time consuming than regular wfp work. But it seems like it’s a real labor saver compared to the alternative.
What remains to be seen is whether the glass will rinse streak free. I have a feeling I will still need to nose-to-glass for perfect results. In which case, the labor savings might not be significant. But I would still prefer to scrub with chems than scrape with muscle.
Razor I find is the best. Also try these, Goo Gone, Varsol(this one should work great),Methyl Hydrate
I have had luck with a plastic putty knife for the first pass and follow up with a fresh razor with a wet window.
I’ll keep that in mind if I run into that again!
your mouth is the best tool, lol
I had a client with a 10k sft house and those things oozing all over and she asked me to “just get rid of it as I went thru”, yeah right. She had put window film on the inside, which probably wasn’t recommended
I just told her it would be so time consuming she would never want to pay the bill and guess what, next time I come back there will be more, besides she doesn’t want me possibly compromising her Pella warranty does she? Since that stuff is in place as a sealant etc etc. I mentioned her window film was no doubt worsening the problem as well.
on the outside, tucker brush and nylon bristles got rid of the shadow on the outside of the blob stuff real good, the bristles would be black after doing the job. If I was squeegeeing I would just run steel wool quickly around the border to get rid of the pre-blob-creeping shadow. Same on the inside with the steel wool if necessary
but blading that goop off, every window, no way
Apart from the poor choice of seal material, these were some pretty cool windows.
Instead of just tilting in, they pivot 360°, so you can work in tighter areas, and don’t have to worry about marring the sills.
Bugs love to build their nests in the tracks, though. Vacuum cleaner should be standard equipment if you’re gonna tilt pivot these in.
So an update I forgot to mention last week, was that I switched from the OneRestore, to LA’s Totally Awesome cleaner. I put it in the pump sprayer straight. It did an even better job at removing the gunk, since it’s a degreaser and not an acid. It also kept my brush looking nice throughout the job.
One pain point I still had was rinsing. I’d love to find some ph neutral additive that makes heavy duty cleaners like this rinse easier. Any ideas, @Henry?
Hi Alex,
Here is the ingredients list from the SDS of the LA Cleaner
0.01 to 2.5 Orange Oil Blend(CAS# 8008-57-9) & (CAS#111-76-2))
0.5 to 4.0 Ethoxylated Alcohol (CAS# 9036 19 5)
0.5 to 1.5 Disodium Salt (CAS# 6834-92-0)
0.5 to 1.5 Tetra Sodium EDTA (CAS# 64-02-8)
0.5 to 0.8 Hydroxy Sodium (CAS# 1310-73-2)
QS Water (CAS# 7732-18-5)
I am guessing your rinsing problem is related to the orange oil. Which is likely not water miscible. This is the reason they added the ethoxylate surfactant. Just a wild guess here. But if you were to add just enough of an organic solvent that was water miscible that might make the product easier to rinse. I would really love the opportunity to work with Titan Labs on their stuff. These people are not stupid. I have tried to get their attention but it hasn’t worked.
Alex, please email me if you have more in depth questions.
Henry
