2300 psi pressure washer won't help deck?

[buzzweetman]

I have a Craftsman 2300 psi pressure washer that I am using to clean my deck. The deck is several years old and has never been sealed. The wood looks grey.

I tried pressure washing a small area to start. The pressure washer makes a big difference, but it would take days if not weeks to get all the gray surface wood off. I had to adjust the nozzle down to a fan of about 1.5 inches wide and get very close just to make a difference. And I had to go over and over the spot. Plus it didn't look very consistent.

What do I need to do? I see chemicals on the market. Will they soften up the gray surface so the pressure washer will work?

Thanks for any help Buzz

[RickH]

Weathered wood IS gray, thats not something to be "gotten off" like dirt. Some people like the gray wood and just clean and clear seal it as-is. To not have gray wood you have to first clean it with the washer, (it will still be gray), let it dry. Then you can stain it to get rid of the gray and waterproof it in one step. Or you can use a bleaching product followed by a clear waterproofer, if the original wood is exotic enough to want to retain its God-given color. With the latter it is likely to go gray in a couple years anyway. For normal decks with Cedar or PT lumber I would just opt for clean then stain. If it's made out of Teak then I would probably opt for the clean/ bleach/seal method as Teak has a beautiful color of it's own.

[terry]

And pressure washing can eat into the wood digging out the softer parts of the grain but leaving the harder parts. Not good. And to expect weathering wood to 'not' go grey outside in almost any climate from desert to ice seems unreasonable? Possibly the only way would be to coat it with something clear the moment it has been installed? But why? Whats wrong with the products natural weathering? An alternative to wood might be to use some product such as that planking that's made with concrete. That, or use 'plastic wood' made from recycled plastic scrap! AIUI that comes in various colours and dose not rot like wood?

[willshak]

on 8/8/2007 12:51 PM [e-mail] said the following:

When I stained my 10 year old 12 x 30 deck, I first sanded the whole thing down with a craftsman 3" belt sander, and a few spare belts, having sunk the deck nails down about 1/16". It took a long time and my back hurt for days afterwards, but it came out nice and I used Cabot's semi transparent New Cedar stain. 5 years later, it still looks good.

[buzzweetman]

I spent more time looking around. There are actually many products out there that are said to get rid of the gray deck surface.

This page describes different deck cleaning chemicals:

DeckBrite is a product I am interested in: I do plan on staining... but my deck was built in stages. Some wood is newer than other... and so some is gray and some is new. If I use a solid stain, I suppose getting rid of the gray might not be necessary. But I'm not sure. I would not be happy to stain the whole thing only to find you can see the difference between new and old wood.

Getting rid of the gray should make all the wood look consistent before I stain. This seems less risky.

[willshak]

on 8/9/2007 1:12 PM [e-mail] said the following:

Yes, it will require getting rid of the gray, otherwise it will be as uneven looking as now, except for a different color difference.