[Robert Parry]

Hope you can help guy's!

Just picked up a new contract for a national client, 16 offices nationwide, the first 4 of which come online in January 2009, the rest following throughout the year.

As part of this contract we have to clean the carpets 4 times a year in all offices, upto now we have used porty's or farmed out the work if large areas need cleaning, however I feel now could be the time to bring large commercial carpet cleaning in house.

All buildings are 2/3 floors, so a bit big for the old porty's, so my question, which truckmount?

The buildings are all between 20,000 and 40,000 sq ft.

The truckmount must have enough oomph, to deal with this size of building, and if possible a dual wand setup, reliability, running costs etc must also be reasonable, another important aspect would be after sales service.

Any thoughts, comments would be greatfully recieved.

Regards,

Rob

[Mike Halliday]

I don't think a truckmount would best suit your needs, I'd be looking at a bonnet system or Cimex.

 a T/M for duel wanding, you need to be looking at top of the range hydramster, prochem or Alltecs blueline range, but you'll be hitting near the 20 grand price on all of them (not including the van to put it in)


it looks like access could be problem that's why i suggest looking at alternative methods.

[Robert Parry]

Thanks for the reply Mike,

I have had a quick look at the Cimex system, but must confess to being a little worried at the end result, most of the carpet is low profile tiles, do you have any idea of a decent stockist, doesnt have to be all that local, but dont really fancy a trip too far north if you get my meaning 

Regards,

Rob

[Ken Wainwright]

I'd go with Mike on this one too.

Low profiles do respond well to LM systems. Modern chemistry means that you can offer a stand alone maintenance plan/programme with LM where as in the past the LM was just an interim "freshen-up" ie extraction was still required at the end of the year.

I've maintained 2 buildings in the past of 39K and 40k sq' and resoiling was never a problem.

My regime was:
3 months  Entrance/reception, stairways & lift, rest areas and main walkways through open plan offices. Clean any spillage areas as required.

6 months As 3 months plus all workstations

9 months  As 3 months

12 months Wall to wall everywhere.


Every building will have it's own requirements, so the plan above can vary considerably.

Presuming that the work will be weekends, that's 64 weekends spoken for per year! Plan for 2 days for the 12 month clean on 40k sq'.  Obviously logistics/furnishings etc. etc. can influence this.

On the larger premises, I prefer to work as a team of 3.  One to vac, one on the rotary plus myself spraying, dunking pads, fetching water, moving chairs etc. etc.  You have to do everything possible to prevent the rotary from stopping.

I use Dry Fusion and also generic bonnet cleaning. My preferred solutions being a microsplitter or DFC.  For DFC, my Chemspec Distributor tells me that it actually treats old detergent residues as a soil rather than reactivating it, so by removing it along with the soil.  I've only used it for one significant job which was 1200sqM mixed nylon cut pile and loop pile tiles. and I was delighted with the results.

A T/M will perform amazingly in this environment too, but you'll possibly need to refill and dump on site, have hose management and security issues to consider, and may find that it would not be feasible for all sites.

Safe and happy cleaning
Ken

[Mike Halliday]

Sorry Rob just to clarify, are you asking for a decent stockist of T/M or Cimexs or something else?

if I had a lot of low profile carpets to clean I'd be buying the Dry Fusion, £3k gets you the full set up and its perfect for low profile industrial carpets.

and if you are using employees its simple to learn, 30mins and they will be using it like an expert.

Mike

**** Ken answered as I was typing******

[carlton care]

Totally agree with the above. The logistics of using a T/M for the work you describe would not only be a nightmare, but potentially very expensive.

The contract may have a reasonably high value, but, apart from the capital cost to service it, you would need pretty good cash flow to justify it.

There is only one company I know who handle this type of work in large volume and they use Chemstactors, which could be substituted by D/F or Tex or other rotary system as already mentioned above.

[Robert Parry]

Many thanks to all of you guys,

Going to look at the Dry Fusion system on the web a bit later on today, £3,000 setup seems a steal too, will let you know what I decide and how it all pans out, once again many thanks!

Regards,

Rob

[JandS]

You could do it on nights or evenings.
Biggest I've done so far was 1400 sq/m heavily soiled and chewing gummed.
Took me 4 full nights 10 till 8 and 1 night 10 till 3 using a large porty.
Hard work but worth it at the end.
Don't know if the above mentioned methods would have got the same results as HWE.

John

[JandS]

An addition to the above.
There was no way you could have used a TM on it due to both access for the hose and the security of your equipment outside.

John

And come on now, we're in the EEC now you must use sq/m!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[carlton care]

Do you charge Euros for your services ???Just discovered my Toshiba has no euro button !

[JandS]

No round here it's Rupees, ask Mark Powell

John

[richie]

Office carpets take one hell of a hammering.  If you do not know how often the carpets have been cleaned in the p[ast & what method was used i would go for Hot Water Extraction on the first clean.  Low moisture systems will clean the carpet however, they will NOT deep clean them.  Offive low profile carpets will hold a high amount of soiling that you will not see.  Office carpets ideally need extracting AT LEAST ONCE A YEAR maybe TWICE.

Richie.