I did not choose a truckmount because it is truckmounted or because it runs on petrol. I chose to go truckmounted because it is a vastly superior machine to any of the 20 odd portable that machine that I have owned. None of them even came close. Like Simon I started out with a single vac oscilating pump machine, because at the time that was all I knew about. As my business improved so did the equipment. The difference between the two, is not just that one is built into the van and the other is not.
The machines are beyond comparison I only have a small truckmount but that produces 18 hp of power. That would equate to approx. the power you could get from 7 x 13 amp plugs give or take.
When I use a portable the drop in power is so vast that you wonder whether the machine is working properly. You cannot compare it to a truckmount.
The difference in power is far, far greater than the difference you would experience from going to a high end portable to something like a puzzi machine. I remember making the move up and it gave me result that were beyond comparison, and I did get results that I would have never achieved with the far inferior equipment.
You cannot make an informed decision on this subject by reading the information that some people talk about on here, you only need to see a truckmount alongside a portable to realise it I like comparing chalk and cheese.
It is always the porties, who compare their machines to truckmounts we who have experience of both understand that they are quite simply beyond comparison.
Peter