What is roof soft washing?
Roof Soft Washing is the safest and best way to clean your roof. Soft washing is the professional way to safely remove mold, algae, moss, black streaks, and lichen from a multitude of roofing materials. iShine Cincy can make your roof look new at a fraction of the cost!
To better understand how to clean a roof without causing damage we will explain the types of washing and explain why soft washing is the best way to clean your roof.
What is Pressure Washing?
Pressure washing would be a combination of a machine and wand (the gun, tips, orifice) that would produce between 3,000 - 4,500 psi (pound per square inch). We refer to this as high pressure. The importance of knowing the pressure that your machine and equipment are producing will make sure that you avoid damaging your property. This is what you most likely have used at your home before, and the most likely to cause damage - see image.
iShine Cincy uses this cleaning process for hard concrete surfaces. These hard surfaces around your home and/or business include areas like driveways, sidewalks, dumpster pads, drive-thru, and pedestrian paths. What separates us from our competition is that our equipment can heat the water to over 250 degrees. This helps in removing hard contaminants like grease stains, oil stains, paint, gum, graffiti, and tire marks.
What is Power Washing?
Power washing would be a combination of a machine and wand (the gun, tips, orifice) that would produce between 500 - 1,500 psi (pound per square inch). We refer to this as medium pressure. The benefit of our equipment being able to adjust to this level is that we can get some of the strength of pressure washing along with the distance of soft washing to clean areas up to 40 feet away using downstream solutions. With the reduced amount of pressure, this process is safe on most surfaces.
We use this cleaning process, power washing, for power washing brick houses, decks, new concrete, and vehicles. The use of medium pressure allows our machines to downstream the correct ratio of solution to clean at the appropriate pressure removing the risk for damage. This process removes mold, algae, dirt, mildew, and rust.
What is Soft Washing?
Soft washing is a special machine that produces between 60 - 300 psi (pound per square inch). We refer to this as low pressure. This amount of low pressure cannot be found when using a power washer. This type of cleaning allows us to clean any surface without fear of damage due to its low rating of maximum pressure (Machines max of 300 psi).
iShine Cincy uses our gas-powered soft washing machines to safely and professionally clean roofs and other delicate surfaces like vinyl, stucco, aluminum, and Trex decking. The correct ratio of cleaning solutions and soaps is applied to the surfaces at 60-100 psi. When house washing our soft washing machines are set between 100-300 psi. The solutions are carefully selected to clean each surface differently depending on the stain being removed. We often soft wash off mold, algae, mildew, rust, and dirt.
Does roof washing help my roof?
Roofs have an average lifespan of 20 years. The lifespan of a roof can be greatly shortened by mold, algae, and lichen growing on the shingles. Roofs are the protective covering for a home against rodents, rain, wind, snow, hail, and debris. Mold and algae can penetrate and separate the layering of shingles causing them to fail in protecting your home. Roofing damage can cost thousands so it's important to take care of your roofs so they can take care of you!
Roof pressure washing and power washing are highly dangerous to not only the roof but the user as well. Pressure washing is used to clean hard stains and solid surfaces. Pressure washing should only be used on concrete surfaces. Power washing is also a dangerous cleaning method for most roofing materials. Power washing consists of a machine producing medium pressure (500-1500 psi). Power washing is only safe for metal roofing material in some cases. Power washing is not as severe as pressure washing but can still cause harm to asphalt shingled, slate, and tile roofs. These roofing materials should be soft-washed.
Can washing my roof damage it?
Roof soft washing is iShine Cincy’s sole way of cleaning all roofing types. Soft washing requires a chemical metering system along with a low pressured machine. Our roof cleaning solution can be adjusted on each job for different roofing materials and levels of mold and algae growth. Our soft washing machines have a maximum pressure of 300 psi. Our preferred pressure for roof cleaning is 60-150 psi. We can safely and successfully clean all roofs with our soft washing method. Our cleaning solution does the majority of the work allowing the least amount of pressure on your roofs.
iShine Cincy can clean tile shingles, asphalt shingles, wood shingles, metal roofs, slate shingles, synthetic rubber shingles, and TPO flat roofs. The most common roofing material we clean in Cincinnati is asphalt shingled roofs. 80 percent of homes in Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky, and Dayton have asphalt shingled roofs. We are Cincinnati’s top-rated roof cleaning company.
We have the knowledge, equipment, and training to clean your roof the best way possible. Our roof cleaning packages begin at $0.25 per square foot. Our estimates are done virtually, and the cleaning process can be done in a day. The average price in Cincinnati is around $500 coming with a two-year spot-free guarantee.