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Flocked brush as my daily brush

DeLaCruz

Active member
Messages
424
Location
Cornwall
Just wondering if anyone uses a flocked brush for their daily maintenance cleans  ? I really like the brush its become my favorite so use it way more than the other brushes i have, i am using it with a rinse bar for on glass rinsing. Just wondered if anyone else uses these daily for lower dirt jobs

 
Just wondering if anyone uses a flocked brush for their daily maintenance cleans  ? I really like the brush its become my favorite so use it way more than the other brushes i have, i am using it with a rinse bar for on glass rinsing. Just wondered if anyone else uses these daily for lower dirt jobs
Regularly use a 45cm flocked, glides over the glass very easily.

 
The flocked with a rinse bar wouldn't be ideal as the flocked gathers a lot of "stuff" from the windows and then deposits it back onto the glass when cleaning. The rinse bar works much better on windows that dont have many large bits of stuff on them to be rinsed off, I find.

 
I used to use a flocked as a regular brush but found the bristles too soft and would get all matted and splay all over the place interfering with the pencil jets so I quickly kicked it in to touch.

 
Interesting thanks for the feedback guys - a lot of the cleans i do are first cleans since i am building a round up from scratch - for the really dirty ones i use the medium mixed sill brush + ubik. Most of my regular maintenance cleans are either coastal or on a new local building estate where there is constant dust build up  every month. I have a bunch of different Gardiner brushes but am still searching for the ideal day to day brush for fairly dirty coastal and new estate cleans. Also trying to learn more about the physics of the brushes and how they effect cleaning performance

 
Interesting thanks for the feedback guys - a lot of the cleans i do are first cleans since i am building a round up from scratch - for the really dirty ones i use the medium mixed sill brush + ubik. Most of my regular maintenance cleans are either coastal or on a new local building estate where there is constant dust build up  every month. I have a bunch of different Gardiner brushes but am still searching for the ideal day to day brush for fairly dirty coastal and new estate cleans. Also trying to learn more about the physics of the brushes and how they effect cleaning performance
I work on the coast and its seagull season here in full flow.

I have loads of brushes from different suppliers, I love Gardiners brushes for the weight but dont find them to be as aggressive as I would like.

Today as most days I used my tucker dual trim mono, it really is the best brush I've ever owned by a country mile. The bristles are very densely packed and stiff, this thing will eat through whatever is on the glass, you hardly have to apply any pressure and you can feel it doing its job. I have the boars hair version too but find the mono to be more effective when agitating and it glides way better so less strain.

I find the boars hair is great for snail trails and marks that are made up of very small particles, things that are not raised up off the glass if you get me. I also like boars hair/natural bristle for hydrophobic glass better, you can feel it dragging along the glass and is similar to using a microfiber cloth.

I find that when you have a bird muck that is very stubborn then do your agitations in circles, its way more effective than simple up/down side/side motion. Your hitting the mess from every angle with the bristle and finding its weakest point to lift it off from much quicker.

The more bristle tips you have in contact with the glass the better, and you want the tips on the glass not the sides of the bristles (unless its natural/boars hair then you do want the sides as that type of bristle work very well like that) as soon as the brush starts to splay to the point where the bristle tips leave contact with the glass then your losing effectiveness. You want to be applying just enough pressure, let the bristle tips do the work.

The tucker is heavier than a lot of Gardiner brushes which is a drawback, but if your posture is good when cleaning above ground floor it shouldn't be too much of an issue. They weigh in at 260 ish grams, the boars hair feels heavier when wet as it holds more water.

I also use the Gardiner 14" extreme a lot, either with rinse bar or 4x1.8mm jets (you have to drill out the 1.4mm jets yourself) some parts of town just dont need a brush to be so aggressive and the extreme is an excellent brush for most maintenance cleans, you can really fly through the windows with it.

 
^^ thanks Paul - i read in another thread you thought the pencil jets were too fierce on that tucker brush when turned up - can i ask how you use it (what water setup) for semi dirty first cleans with cobwebs and muck around the frames ? I have been using a quite high flow rate in general especially on first cleans and was under the impression pencil jets ruled for dirty first cleans for ease of rinsing in specific areas.

Also curious does the tucker dual trim mono perform okay with Ubik / Virosol products ? thanks in advance for the tips ?

 
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I used to use a flocked as a regular brush but found the bristles too soft and would get all matted and splay all over the place interfering with the pencil jets so I quickly kicked it in to touch.


?

In a by-gone era we used the infamous car washing Vikan oval with flocked bristles. To this day I believe that those were the best flocked brushes we have ever used on a daily basis. Those brushes just seemed to work so well, especially over leaded glass. In our experience the bristles never matted. In time with constant use the flocked ends wore away which seemed to make the brush better to work with.

The weight of that brush for window cleaning was its achilles heel as was the red rubber bumper trim that left red scuff marks on window frames. Its moulded pole connector was also at the wrong angle for window cleaning.

There was a windie somewhere who tried to remove all the bristles from a Vikan Oval and fit them into the stock of a much lighter brush after removing its bristles. I seemed to think it was the stock from a Bentley floor brush. It wasn't a success which proved that there is more to brush design than 'meets the eye'.

I have often wondered how I would rate this Vikan brush now if I went back to using one when there is a very good choice of purpose made window cleaning brushes available.

In my younger days I owned a 1960 American Chevorlet 4 door. My dream car was the earlier 1959 Chevrolet V8 coupe 2 door. Would I like to own and drive one now? No because modern cars are more comfortable, safer (have seat belts) and much better to drive.

 
I prefer the lightweight xtreme nat hybrid for regular maintenance work. I regularly use a flocked brush on leaded work but find when wet it's considerably heavier than the preferred xtreme. End of the day though it comes down to what works for you and your work. Probably fair to say that no one brush is the best for all types of work.

 
i tend to use flocked brushes for cleaning my van and car these days.....however i do have one flocked brush which is the king of flocked brushes for really dirty first cleans and thats a black gardiners SL flocked brush,it has great scrubbing power.....however the downside is you have to rinse off the glass and the bristle ends hold onto the dirt more than other brushes.....

 
?

In a by-gone era we used the infamous car washing Vikan oval with flocked bristles. To this day I believe that those were the best flocked brushes we have ever used on a daily basis. Those brushes just seemed to work so well, especially over leaded glass. In our experience the bristles never matted. In time with constant use the flocked ends wore away which seemed to make the brush better to work with.

The weight of that brush for window cleaning was its achilles heel as was the red rubber bumper trim that left red scuff marks on window frames. Its moulded pole connector was also at the wrong angle for window cleaning.

There was a windie somewhere who tried to remove all the bristles from a Vikan Oval and fit them into the stock of a much lighter brush after removing its bristles. I seemed to think it was the stock from a Bentley floor brush. It wasn't a success which proved that there is more to brush design than 'meets the eye'.

I have often wondered how I would rate this Vikan brush now if I went back to using one when there is a very good choice of purpose made window cleaning brushes available.

In my younger days I owned a 1960 American Chevorlet 4 door. My dream car was the earlier 1959 Chevrolet V8 coupe 2 door. Would I like to own and drive one now? No because modern cars are more comfortable, safer (have seat belts) and much better to drive.
Funny you should mention bristle swapping

FB701C72-FB73-4E91-9E90-CB1DF117B49D.jpeg

 
^^ thanks Paul - i read in another thread you thought the pencil jets were too fierce on that tucker brush when turned up - can i ask how you use it (what water setup) for semi dirty first cleans with cobwebs and muck around the frames ? I have been using a quite high flow rate in general especially on first cleans and was under the impression pencil jets ruled for dirty first cleans for ease of rinsing in specific areas.

Also curious does the tucker dual trim mono perform okay with Ubik / Virosol products ? thanks in advance for the tips ?
Yeah that's right, the jets that the brush came with were 1.0mm or thereabout. I couldn't find a replacement for them in the uk so I simply put a 2mm drill bit through them.

I have experimented with all different size jets, rinse bars and fans but I think its hard to beat some good old 2mm jets. They seem to be the sweet spot.

I have 2mm pencil jets on both my tucker brushes, but on the dual trim I have pointed the pencil jets toward each other so that when the flow hits the glass the two jets combined produce a really good rinse, its my favourite at the minute. I'll put a picture up in a minute.

I dont have a digital controller but I generally use 3/4 power or a little less.

I use caustic TFR from exceed and it works a treat with the tucker, just DO NOT LEAVE IT TO DRY and touch wood I've never had an issue.

 
Nice man - thanks so much for the advice .

Curious on how you tilted the new manually fitted 2mm jets inwards - did you just drill the new 2mm holes at a slight angle ? Or is there another way to tilt the jets once fitted ?

 
Nice man - thanks so much for the advice .

Curious on how you tilted the new manually fitted 2mm jets inwards - did you just drill the new 2mm holes at a slight angle ? Or is there another way to tilt the jets once fitted ?
When I got the brush the 2 jets were in the holes close to the outside of the brush, I didn't like that so much so I took them out and refitted them in the other holes closer to the Quicloq fitting. When I put them back in I pushed them in halfway and realised I could manipulate the angle whilst they were only half way in as they were not in tight like they are when in fully. 

I was rinsing a huge hydrophobic piece of glass that was taking ages, the water has nearly no effect on the glass. So I took the pole hose out from the brush and aimed it straight at the glass, the flow was massive and rinsed the big bugger off in no time. Thats how I came to aim the two jets together because I realised that the flow is more effective when concentrated.

 
Here is a modded version of tucker dual mono brush with the 2mm pencil jets.  To make the jets point inwards I used Gardiner pole tape - I strapped a small wedge of folded tape to the outside of the jet using a thin stripe of tape. (Attached a picture) 

I then super glued the jets into the inner brush hole - pointing the jets inwards and also slightly downwards to aid rinsing. 

724043F3-D50F-4C90-9D6D-7BE27CDE1863.jpeg

250F7F87-A6B2-41B8-B29E-0D04D4F03AEF.jpeg

 
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