Pressure washers - any reccomendations ?

[Scrums]

Had a fairly rubbish cheapo one from Focus that lasted a year or so....

Karcher are the brand ( aren't they ?) any ideas for a good one - washing the patio, getting the green slime off an increasingly tatty looking camper van etc ?

Chris.

 

[Steve Jones]

Chris,

Reading on quite a few forums Karcher are the one's to avoid mainly because quite a bit of the internals are plastic and eventually split. IMO the brand to go for are Alto Nilfisk because as far as I can make out quite a bit of the internals are metal/cast. I've had to replace internal parts on my Karcher and when/if it goes again it will be an Alto Nilfisk for me.

Regards

Steve

 

[Gary]

I'll second the Alto.

The new Karcher's are $h1t.
(If I can't say that they're not a patch on the old ones)

 

[Max Power]

Another vote for the Alto. Ive got one of their hot washers and its been excellent, before that I had three different machines in two years

 

[Walter Hall]

Never mind the brand. Pay a bit more and buy a professional model. I went through three domestic/diy machines before I bought a decent one. It has now lasted as long as the three cheapies put together.

Buy cheap buy twice.

 

[RobertMP]

When comparing the specs look at the water throughput more than the pressure figure. No good having loads of pressure but only enough water to clean a pencil width line.

 

[matt]

Only ever had one pressure washer (so nothing to compare it too) but I'll say Alto too. It's about 8 years old now and still doing the job.

 

[dannykaye]

I have a cheap and cheerful £30 from wicks, its great, however it just won't clean the car, cleans the cra* off the patio like magic but just spreads the dirt on the car round so itis evenly spread, seems you need a lot higher pressure for that...

 

[Argee]

Nilfisk Alto range, without question!

Ray

 

[lurker]

Cheapest thing is to do what I do

Borrow my neighbour's :lol:

 

[Dibs-h]

Never mind the brand. Pay a bit more and buy a professional model. I went through three domestic/diy machines before I bought a decent one. It has now lasted as long as the three cheapies put together.

Buy cheap buy twice.

I've got a Karscher - but it ain't domestic model and 10yrs on - fine.

 

[Scrums]

Thanks for all your replies, I had a sneaky feeling that Karcher were trading on their reputation.......currently checking prices on a Nilfisk ALTO C120 xtra, best so far is £136.97 I think that's the way I'll be going.

Cheers,

Chris.

 

[dedee]

£7 quid cheaper at Screwfix

Andy

 

[dickm]

Bad experience with Karcher here too. I suspect they have a specification problem with the plastic innards, as mine has split too. I think it's one of the 580 series. You can get new internal bits, but not sure it's worth the hassle.
Might try araldite.......