hi Dave
welcome to the forum, iam no expert on carpet cleaning. iam a contract cleaner/window cleaner. However i do offer carpet cleaning as a bolt on, extra service.
having come on here a bit recently i found i have fallen behind the times a lot on whats out there. so though not new to cc i have had a recent steep learning curve.
i thought i would share my thoughts with you so far.
You need a good hwe machine as your core tool. the favourites seem to be a scorpion now being replaced with the jaguar or an airflex. there are few others but this is what i have distilled it down to. you will get a scorpion or airflex used for just shy of 2000. a jaguar new is just over 3000. you would hope to get some hoses and a wand for that.
i have also had mentioned the powerflight machine and the texatherm machine but in my mind have settled on the airflex or jaguar. So havnt looked at them in any detail
if money is an issue there are some tidy ashby ninjas out there for just over 1000 ish.
remember to budget for your bits and bobs. everything is expensive in cc for what it is imo. ie a short bristled brush is called a pile brush and costs 30 quid when it should be a fiver. a glorified 5 litre spray bottle is a few hundred instead of 30 quid etc. of course you can always make do with wilkos gear in short term.
the truckmount question is one iam asking myself in the thread truckmount vs porty. it seems you can get up and running with used tm for 3-4000 plus van.
i have come to the conclusion that you can clean quicker with tm when you are experienced and got your routines down pat. I think this takes a while to come though.
the entry level machine iam looking at is the prowler. there are a couple of others mentioned in that post at the same level all spoken of highly. the daddy is the titan but is about the price of a house.
remember though the guys making the money on the tm are booked up solid so it pays for itself because of productivity. we wont be that busy at first so will we get the benefit? mind you even if it means getting the work booked in and getting home earlier or out canvassing its probably a good thing.
the other thing to remember like anything used is getting a good one that isnt knackered. the whole experience could be ruined if you get one that breaks down every five mins and costs a grand to sort out.
hope it helps a bit, like stated not an expert but this as far as i have got with my research
cheers
john