[macmac]

Doug, as promised, an honest oppinion on the new brush.
All referances are to vikan rectangular.

Used the brush now on a variety of different jobs & i can say it's an excellent all-round brush. It definatley holds a lot less dirt than the flocked one & for any that does stick in the brisstles a quick smack through with the hand sorts it. Because vikan pack the brisstles in so tightley (which i personaly like) some bits do stick in nown again further down but not at the tips (most important bit). It feels  lighter in use than the flocked as it holds less water, the flow through the brush is perfect (2mm pencil jets). this one was from cleantech, the jets, pipe & connector are top quality & the placement of the jets is perfect (a bit wider than most suppliers place them, which is great for me). The brisstles are a bit stiffer than the flocked & so flick a bit more but not a problem. It's better for bird poo, did a first clean with it, farm house covered in swallows nests, no problem. Tested it on two windows side by side, one rinsed brush on & the other brush off (bottom windows), both came up perfect (they were a maintainence clean, not a first clean).
One thing that is different to the flocked brush is that the brisstles dont splay out from the stock.i.e. they are 90 degrees from the stock all way round, normaly not a problem but for bottom sections of sash windows it's harder to cut into the corners. However, i've sorted my brush by grinding all the excess stock off it all way round, just to leave about 2mm from edge to brisstles. This has made a real difference & cured the sash problem, will be doing the same to my flocked ones, the brush now looks & feels a lot smaller & is less restrictive.

Overall a great brush, i don't think you will be dissapointed if you do buy one. It has now taken over as my main brush.

Tony

[DASERVICES]

Cheers Tony,

Will now get one, good to see honest reveiws.

Doug

[NWH]

No Mac i do have one of these brushes and to start off with like you i thought it was the best brush i`d used,but the more i used it the more i disllike it.I find it tends to flick the water around the top frame and i still find it quiet heavy,i tried it on one of my quickest houses i have just to see if i needed to rinse less compared to the cleantech`s own yellow flocked 12",i don`t know if you have that cleantech brush but i`m sure you will like it far more than the vikan.I will be taking order of some new really light brushes soon that are designed for the fishing type poles but are ridiculously light on your general poles,i know there are other light brushes out there but to be honest most are C***,trust me i`ve tried almost all of them.I`ve got so fed up with this brush problem that i`m having my own made which i will be selling,i`ll keep you posted,who would of thought it me offering to sort YOU out a brush LOL.

[macmac]

As far as i know the yellow cleantech brush is a salmon?
There's no doubt that the vikan is not the lightest of the bunch but i find the new rectangular vikans (flocked & mono) work brilliantly for me. I dont normaly clean frames & NEVER clean the top frame & i find these brushes just so accurate in use that the fact that its a bit heavier is more than a fair trade off.

Will defo be interested in your new brush empire, so keep us posted & lets hope we dont fall out in the meantime

tony

[drakestar!]

i thought it was an excellent brush but i got one of cleantechs own brushes (yellow one) and it is amazing! its wider so you clean more glass which means im quicker, so more money. it just seems to eat up the dirt!

[Jeff Brimble]

Tony,
 If use the bristles pointed slightly upwards you may find you only have to grind the sides of the brush stock to get the bristles to splay into the cornersetc
Its a comon fault with nearly all brushes, I do it the hard way with a surform as some of the plastic heads melt under a grinder.

[Davew]

Interesting techniques there. I always clean the frames. I always clean the top frame too and treat it the same as the glass. maybe I'm too fussy - just can't see the point in  cleaning the glass only it just looks lazy to me. (but I am new). I have a theory that if I left the top frame filthy the smallest overspray will pick up dirt and dribble down the window.

[Jeff Brimble]

As long as you dont flood the water everywhere and only use the top edge of a splayed brush you wont get dribbles and neither will you pick up contaminants from the top of the frame, its a bit of an old wives tale.

[Clear Vision]

Thanks for the review.

I have had the flocked rectangular vikan for some time now and really like it. (a bit on the heavy side)

 I recently bought a small 8ft glass fibre pole from cleantech and it came with there yellow flocked brush. (salmon I think) I find it almost identical to the flocked rectangular vikan but a lot lighter and easier to use.

I would like to try the new vikan mono brush to compare it to the cleantech one.
Although the cleantech one is flocked it doesn't hold much dirt and the bristles are stiff enough to enable a good scrub of the glass.

I strongly disagree with the comment above that not washing the top frame is lazy. (It's not necessary all the time)

This is a whole new debate in it's self.lol  So many wash the lot and others do the glass only.

I will explain to you why and how I will wash a window.

 On a first clean I was everything. Even the top frame. (get all the dirt off)

Then on the next visit I will only wash the side of the frames and the glass. (that's not lazy) I leave the top frame as it should stay clean for a couple of months and only when I see the dirt building up I will do the top frame. Sometimes I only do the top frame twice a year.

[Londoner]

When you get a problem with runs and spots its most likely to be from muck washing down from the top of the frame.
You can try giving the top a good wash but often you open up a can of worms because if you don't get every last bit you will have the residue running down the glass afterwards.
However, if you try and leave well alone you still risk rinsing off something that you didn't intend to.

Bu66ered if you do, bu66ered if you don't.

I tend to adopt Clear Vision's approach but all the talk in the early days of poor results on first cleans with a WFP system was due in no small part to this problem.

I tend to say to the customer after a first clean that a lot of dirt was shifted from the frames because they were so bad, so don't be too concerned if there are a couple of small runs this time on the upstairs windows (I always dry the top of the frames downstairs myself anyway.)

I'm really not sure if this is a good idea or not. I suspect I am sensitising a lot of customers to a problem they would'nt have noticed if I hadn't said anything.

The good thing is that this time of year the windows are virtually dry by the time you leave anyway so any runs are visible.

[macmac]

Tony,
 If use the bristles pointed slightly upwards you may find you only have to grind the sides of the brush stock to get the bristles to splay into the cornersetc
Its a comon fault with nearly all brushes, I do it the hard way with a surform as some of the plastic heads melt under a grinder.

Thanks Jeff

I actually use any brush with the bristles pointing slightly downwards, this helps to prevent water from going onto the top frame thus making the job quicker & easier as less effort in accuracy is needed, but also it allows you to clean the top beading with the tops (not the tips) of the bristles better without wetting the top frame.

Just to add to the review, i think the brush would be better with slightly splayed bristles & just a tiny bit softer.

tony

[Jeff Brimble]

Tony,
Thats the problem with the perfect brush- it doesnt exist because we all have different types of work. But generally I much prefer a brush that will splay and then you can use the sides of the bristles to wash the glass/cut in. Than a stiff brush that has the wire brush effect and leaves lines.