Chewing Gum Removal Steam Cleaner

810f250 said:
(calm tone....) Hey guys I did not post 300 degrees to start a fuss, notice what I mentioned, modified pressure washer.

Most contractor grade units can hit 300 F, the question is at what flow????

With safe adequate pressure, adequate flow, the correct energy harnessing nozzle, safety precautions/devices (hose etc),
Click to expand...


(with and even calmer, inquisitive, and surprisingly humble tone.....) I was asking if something had changed or if you had found a different methodology that made your change your mind about 300 degrees vs 225 or so since our conversation in Las Vegas. If you have changed your mind, I was just curious as to what has caused the change. Thanks Nigel.

PS, our propane torch system still removes that petrified gum instantly. And cost about $50.
 
lol. I like your tone, it was even more soothing than mine.


Tony, on this one I have to say the water in Vegas is the problem,....... Vegas weather allows municipality water to develop an "ionic state property" with in the pipelines, hence producing the result that was observed at the DMV.




















Ok, serious now.... the science behind the issue is nozzle expansion.

You cannot harness the full potential of high temps above boiling with the use of an expanding nozzle (for that matter temps below boiling cool also just at exit of expanding nozzle, but not as rapidly as over boiling).

The torch is one of the best solutions and cheapest, .....dependant on the fuel source,... the temperatures the gum rubber could potentially now be exposed to is higher than you could achieve with boiling water at atmospheric pressure.
 
I had to look it up.. wow!!

Burning Propane .................it gets HOT!!! over 3000 Deg F. (maximum adiabatic flame)

Even a standard bunsen burner flame with air pump is over 1000 F


I am guessing that your propane torch Tony is well over 300F, i wonder what it is???
 
I don't think any of us have the strength to damage the concrete with that wide of a scraper.

I took some video of a hack job that was using hammers and screwdrivers to get gum up. The screwdrivers were too skinny and were gouging.

The scraper seemed like a better option so I got one and tried it. It just skipped over the gum. I called Ron and he told me he'd been using scrapers alone like that for years but apparently it only works on fairly new gum, not this black diamond like substance the sun bakes on the concrete here.

So I tried hot water + the scraper. It worked a little better than the water alone

I wondered how I could get this hotter than the water. As I picked up the spatula I had sat down on the barbecue grill and burned my hand I had a EUREKA moment.

But my first thought was to simply heat up the scraper and use the hot scraper alone. After a few experiments it works best when both the gum AND the scraper are hot.

We really only use it on first time accounts. After that the gum is easy.

BTW, we don't use it upside down like that anymore, it works better right side up with a line going down to the scraper.
 
Nigel, we have the same kind of petrified gum here in Texas when it sits over a number of years.

I tried with regular water, with DI water and with water that runs through my water softener into the tank for washing fleets and it made no difference at all.

It is just the sun baking the gum into the concrete over a number of years and the hotter it is, the more it gets baked and turns into glue so the harder it is to remove.

I bought the parts to build the propane scraper but never got around to building it. I need to put it together and give it a try.

Thanks again Tony for the idea.
 
Nigel, Strangely enough the gum burns up nice, and decreases slightly in size. It will flame for a few seconds only. I've never observed it to return to a fully liquid state.

I tried all kinds of methods to remove the gum from the scraper, like custom making a bucket with an apparatus to rub off the gum on the edge and other such wastes of time.

In the end the best method was to just go along as fast as we could, dropping whatever falls off directly on the concrete and letting the wand take care of it in rinsing.

Our debris filters are just leftover polypropylene air filter media and it catches it all if necessary.
 
I guess I'd need to start threads saying I'm going to show the new prototype to everybody, then hint for a long time that I'm going to show it, then get mad at somebody and stop posting. hehehehe.



Seriously, I don't think it needs a next level. It works perfectly well as is.

When the blade wears out we will switch to stainless. Ron says there is a chance of rust from the blade, but we've never experienced it. Maybe that would happen in a wetter climate.

We've talked about using a larger propane tank on a dolly, but so far we haven't needed it. The small cans last plenty long to do most new accounts.
 
In our weather here you would likely see the rust marks.

The only reason i asked about the next level , is because I have seen some very polluted gum walks , ......I was imagining a 12" cleaning path with a torch burner system out front and the scraper following, almost like a plow.. www.gumplow.com
 
At one time I built a multi jet filter cleaning wand for a single swipe cleaning on the filters. It required so much more water it was ineffective and didn't save as much time as expected.

I would imagine that would be the same with a wide wand. Gum is easily tackled in a second or two the way we are doing it.

Give it a shot though. It might work great!
 
That jetter sounds good, but i am thinking you need about 16 gpm to run 4 nozzles. What width was needed? and how much preesure does the pump head read when using the typical single wand with nozzle?


i cant imagine doing these walks (web search images)

gum1.jpgGum.jpg
 
Tony Shelton said:
I guess I'd need to start threads saying I'm going to show the new prototype to everybody, then hint for a long time that I'm going to show it, then get mad at somebody and stop posting. hehehehe.



Seriously, I don't think it needs a next level. It works perfectly well as is.

When the blade wears out we will switch to stainless. Ron says there is a chance of rust from the blade, but we've never experienced it. Maybe that would happen in a wetter climate.

We've talked about using a larger propane tank on a dolly, but so far we haven't needed it. The small cans last plenty long to do most new accounts.
Click to expand...

I bought some stainless steel and had it cut to the size of the scraper blades, just need to drill holes and put an edge on the metal.

I have never been good at sharpening anything, I would like to know how someone would put an edge on stainless steel that has 90 degree edges all around and then if there is a jig you can buy to sharpen them as needed? I would take the pieces of metal to a blade sharpening place but there are not any here anymore, they disappeared along with most of the small engine mechanics. The scrap metal place had long pieces of this stuff so I bought it and had it sheared to the right sizes for scraper blades, just need to get edges on them now.
 
810f250 said:
That jetter sounds good, but i am thinking you need about 16 gpm to run 4 nozzles. What width was needed? and how much preesure does the pump head read when using the typical single wand with nozzle?


i cant imagine doing these walks (web search images)

View attachment 19090View attachment 19091
Click to expand...

Nigel, we have a lot of shopping centers and restaurants here that look like that, that is why I like the idea of Tony's turbo scraper. hahahahaha
 
I did the gumbuster thing for many years. Have converted all accounts to just pressure washing. You have to pressure wash any way or the concrete has all these clean spots. Looks bad at the end. Its quicker to remove the gum with a wand. soft concrete? , turn the heat up and lower the pressure. the steam machine takes 5-15 seconds PER PIECE. 1-2 for the wand and you actually remove it better. plus you have chemical costs with the steamers. the steam by itself doesn't work on the gum, you have to inject a chemical to dissolve the resins. And it doesn't always dissolve all the way and your left with these little gum buggers that you don't see until the concrete is dry.
just go with hot water.
 
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