I cleaned my first roof 2 days ago. The house is my daughters home so she was my guinea pig. I cleaned the roof using an Apple Cider Sauce mix noted below and did not rinse.
15 gallons of chlorine 30 gallons of water 5 lbs. of TSP 64 ounces of alcohol 16 ounces of dawn
This gave me a 33% chlorine mix.
The before picture shows the stains on the roof. Once the mix had been applied a large stain area developed on the front of the roof. Since I did not rinse I assumed it was just dirt, alge, mold, etc that would come off once mother nature had done her job.
After picture shows stain after the roof mix was applied but before rain rinse. We had a good rain this afternoon so I went over to check out the clean roof. But what I found was that the stain was still there.
Any ideas as to what happened and what I can do to get the stain removed?
I asked for soduim hypochlorite. Manager said he had chlorine that people used in their pools which I thought would be OK. If the problem is I have the wrong chemical, is there anything I can do to correct the problem?
I have been thinking about my problem so I should add this piece of information. I purchased my rig used from a guy who runs a business selling to contractors in the cleaning business. The roof chemical tank had a brown stain about 1/3 of the way up on the tank. I was told that a pesticide had been in the tank previously.
Could the stain be the residue of the pesticide? The dark stain in the tank disappeared once I had applied the roof mix.
I am going to make a small batch of roof mix and clean a small section to see if that will clean the stain.
WOW! That is not your right mix and yes they did not sale you the right SH, goggle CHEMSOLV they have independent sales guys and they can sale you 55 gl drums of SH at 12.5 %, do that and use the mix and you should be just fine, good luck.
Anyone think it's the pesticide that was on the tank as a stain? There was no liquid in tank when I made my mix. I still plan to clean a small section to see if the stain will come off.
Take a pump sprayer with a 50/50 (12.5%)mix in a 3sqft section and see what happens if your not using 12.5% sh use store bleach 6% and mix 75% sh to 25% water let it sit about 30-40 minutes and rinse. how much of the mix did you spray on the roof when you first did it, and maybe the sh if it was sh is weak
-- Edited by Roof Cleaning Long Island New York (631) 220 6985 on Thursday 13th of August 2009 09:47:18 PM
-- Edited by Roof Cleaning Long Island New York (631) 220 6985 on Thursday 13th of August 2009 09:50:44 PM
As far as I know calcium hypochlorite is another chlorine used in pools and it would not have done that or really cleaned very effectively either. I wonder what was in that tank?? Also the container should say what the chemical is. If it does not you just learned a valuable lesson the hard way, never use chemicals that are unknown to you, especially in a mixing situation. Also it makes you stand apart from the guy who knows terms like simple green and purple power, but have no idea what caustic soda or ammonia are. Larry has been cleaning roofs for a long time, and if he has never seen this either, it may be hard for us to help. Especially if you can't find out for sure, everything that was in that mix, from tank residue to the type of chlorine used. It is so strange, it looks wet?? Can't try to neutralize it without knowing what it is. Someone should go look at it, I would if I lived near wherever it is.
Thanks for all who are trying to help. I am learning several valuable lessons from this job. I'll give the 50/50 mix on a small section a try and let you know what happens. It's only the one section of the roof that stained and it was the 1st section sprayed. Almost has to do with the residue of the "pesticide" stained tank.
Someone asked how much of the mix I sprayed on the roof. I mixed up a 45 gallon batch and sprayed all but about 4 gallons. Other sections of the roof turned out really nice.
I've seen this before....... Apply another coat of Apple Sauce or Cider, which ever you prefer. What has happened and it happened to me was the pesticide had adhered to the inner portion of the tank and I assume the brown stain you are referring to was that left where the level of fill ended. This pesticide neutralized the chlorine or weakened it. Buy looking at the photos, my guess would be this roof is 12 to 13 years old and had never been cleaned. Therefore the algae had grown deep into the roof and the sauce had enough strength to penetrate it but not to eliminate it. Thus, dark staining. My recommendation is to purchase a can of Iodized Salt pour it in the tank and fill with water. wait 15 to 30 minutes and drain it. Fill again with water and drain a second time. You should now be safe.
We make it a practice to flush and rinse our tanks monthly. If you check the bottom of your tanks every 30 days or so, you will find SH residue on the bottom. This residue can also destroy a pump, clog lines, etc.
I know some pesticides contain Fatty Acids. Ive gotten this on the side of my house before, just a little spot, but I scrubbed the hell out of it and it never came off. Always looks like a grease stain. Just a thought.