A good portion of our backyard is covered in very dirty square cement patio stones and a cement walkway that is very dirty, cracked and uneven. The long term plan is to put in a new walkway, remove the patio stones and plant proper grass (maybe even a small vegetable garden) but in the meantime we have to make do with it as is so we are trying to clean it up.
To clean up the patio stones required some seriously heavy duty washing. For this we borrowed Gillian’s dad’s power washer. Using a power washer is a fairly quick way to clean up your deck/patio/siding for a super low cost. Although we borrowed our power washer, these are likely available to rent from hardware stores, so if you are going to only use it once a year then it may not make sense to purchase one. As you can see it made a HUGE difference on both the cement patio stones and the siding on the back of the house. In total it probably took Chris about an hour and a half. We are hoping this also helps to reduce the amount of dirt that gets tracked in through the back door – we are constantly sweeping!
The place it didn’t work so well was on the painted fencing. We knew that powerwashing could strip the paint, but the fence was so dirty we decided to turn the power washer on the lowest setting and give it a try on one section of fence anyways. Well… it worked… sort of. The dirt did come off, but so did a lot of the paint. This is okay since it was peeling in the first place and the actual fence will need to be replaced anyways but we decided not to use it on the rest of the fence.
What have you used to clean painted wood fences?
One power washing session does not get rid of years of dirt build up but it is definitely a small step in the right direction. With some regular upkeep and a few more vigorous sessions with the power washer we should get some good use of the patio.
Comments