Facade cleaning. What is facade cleaning?
A facade is a buildings exterior. Often reffered to the front of the building where the entrance is that faces onto the street. This can be made up of many different materials including;
- metal cladding,
- glass,
- powder coated aluminum,
- render,
- bricks, stone, etc.
In the British climate, the damp and warm conditions are ideal conditions for organic growth to flourish on a facades exterior. This can present itself with a black or green moss or algae structure. Also in cities, dust can form on the buildings exterior. And in high traffic areas, carbon pollution can form on the facade. Another factor to bear in mind is sunlight. Sunlight can fade coloured materials such as powder coated aluminium. This can make it dull in appearance. But this can be reversed and the building restored to its former glory.
How to clean your buildings facade.
Cleaning a buildings’ facade often creates access issues. Here at LBC, as well as having our own access equiptment in house such as cherry pickers, we also use fully qualified and highly experienced abseilers to reach those hard to access areas.
When cleaning your facade, it is most important that the patina or the structure of the facade is not damaged. By selecting the wrong method for cleaning and cleaning in too harsh a manner, the facade can be damaged.
This has been seen on bricks, render, and even on metal cladding. That’s why it is important to choose an experienced contractor, when selecting your facade cleaning company.
How to clean a facade.
When cleaning bricks, stone or render, we often choose to use the Doff steam cleaning system. LBC are Rosette accredited contractors, who can be found on the Stonehealth directory. Our team are experienced at using the Doff machine, which is a system that produces superheated water and low pressure, to be able to clean a range of different buildings, patina and facades, without damaging the substrate.
Low pressure facade cleaning.
Facades can be cleaned using soft washing methods, which is where cleaning chemicals or biocides are applied using a low pressure system to the surface of the building. These help to kill organic growth and clean the facade. Here at LBC, to ensure we produce excellent results when we clean facades, we often combine steam cleaning with soft washing. After steam cleaning the patina of the building, we apply a biocide, which is often known or referred to as a fungicidal wash. This not only helps to clean the facade to the maximum standard by killing any remaining spores of organic products that may remain behind after cleaning, (especially in textured surfaces), such as render, but it also clings to the surface in a highly concentrated formulation and lasts on the surface to help keep the exterior surface cleaner for longer.
Get your quote today from a company who has over 10 years experience cleaning facades across London and who also have their own access cherry picker and are rosette approved contractors using the Doff system.
