Anyone use a steam cleaner to clean metal barn walls?

[MorningGlory1]

I can’t remember where I read about it, but somewhere someone was talking about using a commercial steam cleaner to get all the gunk off their stall walls. My barn could use a good deep cleaning but I need more information. Does anyone have any experience / info? Thanks!!

[macmtn]

We used a pressure washer:yes:

[Equibrit]

You’d probably take the paint off with a steam cleaner.

[MorningGlory1]

Don’t you end up with a lot of excess water with the pressure washer? I figure it’s going to be a lot of work regardless of how I do it. I’ve hosed it down before, on a really hot day so everything would have a chance to dry a little. Plus, I have a dirt aisle…

[khall]

Best way I have found to reduce the water is to use a bucket with clorox and a mop/scrub brush. I dampen the walls with plain water, scrub with mop or brush then go back over the walls with rags with clean water or lightly spray them. I rake back the shavings into the middle of the stalls and it just takes overnight for the stalls to dry. Need to do this soon with my barn again.

[2DogsFarm]

Years ago neighbors who were farmsitting pressure-washed inside my metal barn while I was away.
It DID leave signs there had been considerable water in the (stonedust) aisle.

That drained fine, but it was humid in there for a couple days.
The wall they did was sparkling clean, but don’t know that I’d want to repeat the experiment with the rest of the barn.

These days I content myself with sweeping the walls clean as high as I can reach with a broom & calling it good.

[LadyBug]

We pressure washed our barn last weekend. We stripped the stalls, used a broom to get down some of the dust/cobwebs from the walls, and then power washed. Yes, it leaves a lot of excess water. Our stalls all have dutch doors and floor mats, and we ended up “sweeping” the water out the doors the best we could. Our aisle is pavers. Everything was still damp the next day, but dried much faster than I would have expected. With that said, it would create a muddy mess in a dirt aisle! Definitely only power wash if you’re going to have a few days to let it dry undisturbed.

[MistyBlue]

![]( use drill brushes on my cordless drill to clean stall walls.
My stall walls are wood, but they have metal caps and grills and that metal gets pretty gross too. Same with the outside of the waterers, one horse uses his to wipe his mouth and nose and the other horse uses his as a built-in ass scratcher. I use the brush on those too to remove gunked on crud. Works pretty darned good!

Here’s a picture of the stall wall, I hadn’t done the bottom 2 boards yet so you can see in this photo just how gross they were:
[IMG]http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y172/MistyBlue5105/10269645_10202891336062939_1182440645691585197_n_zpsab2c69cd.jpg)

Here’s a close up of where I just started brushing the grills, that’s galvanized steel IIRC:
[IMG]http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y172/MistyBlue5105/10169282_10202772249125840_1886134590_n_zpse3177f6d.jpg)

And here’s where I did half of one waterer…seriously my horses are slobs!
[IMG]http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y172/MistyBlue5105/10007459_10202772252205917_98888616_n_zps86188fc4.jpg)

No water except what I spray on before using the drill brush, I use a 50/50 mix of white vinegar and water in a sprayer and mist down the area I’m going to wash. Wait about 10-15 minutes and then turn the drill on and run it over whatever I sprayed. I do keep a handful of rags and towels to wipe after I clean an area, when the brush is scrubbing it makes a slime of the crud that just wipes right off.

Maybe try something like that? The brushes are pretty useful, I originally got them to clean buckets fast and better. But now I use them on almost everything, LOL! I keep threatening the horses that I’m going to use one of them to groom them with! :winkgrin:

[msj]

MistyBlue, I remember you posted the information about where you got your brushes for your drill. Can you post again please. Also which particular brush did you use on your stall walls and insulated water bucket?

Also, I have dried blood to clean up in several of my stalls where my last horse had quite a nose bleeding problem caused by a guttural pouch fungal infection(the vet thought over a gallon of blood:eek:). So far I’ve just used a Pine-Sol and bleach solution with a scrub brush and it’s done a reasonably decent job but there are still signs of the blood splatter. I’m thinking that I could use one of those brushes for cleaning not only remaining blood splatter but the bird crap as well as all the grime that has collected on the 24 yr old stall walls.

Also any other suggestions for solutions for getting any more blood stains off the stall walls and even the rubber mats in the stalls and the aisle. I’m thinking a saline solution as saline will lyse the blood cells but not sure if that will work on several months old of dried blood. Even saline with bleach or Pine-Sol or vinegar etc…

I do plan to have the bare metal walls of the barn pressure washed later this summer. I have rubber mats down over a dirt floor and know I’ll have a wet mess but it should dry with all the doors open pretty well.

[walktrot]

My b/o regularly pressure washes the stalls. She did the entire interior of the building (120x200’, fully insulated steel with an arena and barn) last year using a company that pressure washes houses. I don’t recall it taking that long to dry, and the best part was that the owner is the husband of one of the instructors. Everything was all sparkley and clean. Now the stalls need to be done again, but I think they are going to do it with the regular pressure washer.

[walkinthewalk]

We bought one of these from Lowe’s. It does a terrific job for the money.

http://www.lowes.com/pd_194858-60455-SGY-PWA41_4294612661__?productId=3117685&Ns=p_product_qty_sales_dollar|1&pl=1&currentURL=%3FNs%3Dp_product_qty_sales_dollar|1&facetInfo=

The stalls do get really wet but, I wait for high heat days, wash the walls as soon as I turn the horses out in the AM, then turn a big tub fan on each stall’s back wall when I’m done. They are rarely more than “pretty damp” when the I bring the horses in that night:)

The nice thing about this wand, is that it hangs on a hook and doesn’t take up any room:)