Kärcher Pressure Washer Surface Cleaner 15", Quick Connect, 2600-3200 PSI, Ideal for Driveways, Patios, Decks, Sidewalks

I was a bit skeptical at first as I have always used the spray nozzles to clean my driveway and sidewalks, which are approximately 1500 square feet. I was pretty amazed as this surface cleaner cut the time to complete the job by 2/3 (6 hours to 2 hours) and the normal streaks left when using the nozzle were almost nonexistent. My approach was a little like mowing your lawn where the the surface cleaner did the vast majority of the work (like a lawn mower) and the nozzles were used to cover the places the surface cleaner (like a weed eater). Our sidewalks are lined with river rocks which makes it impossible get up to the edge of the sidewalks with the surface cleaner as they are obstructed by the rocks but this is where you pressure washer nozzles come into play (check out the before and after photos, sorry about shade of the trees). My biggest suggestion would be to edge your lawn before beginning so the surface cleaner can clean right up to the edge of your lawn without having to use the spray nozzles. Also, as you use the surface cleaner, overlap each pass by about 1/3 the width of the surface cleaner. If you flip the surface cleaner over you’ll what I’m talking about as the rotating nozzles are about an inch or so from the outer brush of the cleaner. I hope this review helps you out.

JUNE 2019 UPDATE: Last time I cleaned my friend's driveway with a Karcher ~1800 PSI electric job (and stock wand) it took 6 1/2 hours. Never again I told myself. Since then, I got a Simpson 3200 PSI 2.5 GPM cleaner and then the Karcher surface cleaner. Last week I cleaned my friends driveway AND the sidewalk in front of her house with the new equipment and it took 3 hours. Being that the biggest concern with this surface cleaner is the nut coming loose, I periodically checked it and did not notice any problems with the nut. However, it seems that the plastic housing did turn 90 degrees over the course of the job, so I will continue to monitor it. NOTE: Once in a while I would accidentally let the surface cleaner lift and tilt off the ground and I would notice greater vibration coming from the unit as it's axis would tilt. I could imaging this extra vibration potentially shaking something loose, such as the nut, so I recommend keeping the unit consistently parallel to the ground. I also picked up a 33" wand extension here from Amazon and I highly recommend one for those who have a short wand. The longer wand will save your back. So I still recommend the Karcher surface cleaner. Any new developments and I will update this review.Original Review:I matched this surface cleaner up with a Simpson 3200 PSI 2.5 GPM pressure cleaner with 18" gun and 16" wand, approximately 24" total length. Initial impressions on fairly porous very dirty concrete driveway and sidewalk: Does a good job cleaning. As expected, I had to finish the job by reconnecting my spray wand and rinsing off everything that I cleaned with the Karcher. I found out that some areas were not sufficiently cleaned the first time around and I had to spot clean while rinsing. There is a learning curve with this product as is probably true of all similar surface cleaners. You have to figure out what method works best for you and how fast you should move. Ideally, you want to use the power of your machine to make the Karcher hover over the surface. Not really lifting off but not causing friction between the surface and the brushes that skirt the Karcher either. This is the method, I found, if you can manage it, that causes the least user fatigue. You also need to find the optimum speed at which you should move. This will depend on the PSI and GPM of your machine as well as the surface type and how dirty it is. For my driveway (very dirty), I needed to move pretty slow, maybe a couple inches per second. I was hoiping it would be faster, but it is what it is. Perhaps if I clean it more often, it will be quicker. One thing I will be investing in is a longer wand (to reduce bending over and user fatigue) and I am researching the ideal length. I am a little under 6 feet tall and obviously, the ideal wand length will be a function of user height. If someone has experience here, please let me know in the comments.As far as construction goes: Karcher is a German company, and like most German companies they seem to have a focus on engineering. They seem to do it right where it counts most. The biggest wear area, IMO, is the "bearing". AFAIK, Karcher uses a real sealed bearing and according to another reviewer, most other products in this price range don't really use a proper bearing. They cut corners and use a sleeve and/or washer for the friction area. If you have a product of this type, I'd recommend greasing the sleeve/washer often, perhaps even before or after every use to prevent rapid wear. Prior to buying the Karcher 15" surface cleaner, I looked at the Simpson and PowerFit (also rebranded as Yamaha for even more $$) surface cleaners. They used to be priced about the same as the Karcher, but are now 20-$30 more at the time of this review. The Simpson has a metal deck (which may rust?) but the same pseudo bearing as the PowerFit. The Karcher deck seems to be made of a durable plastic with a stiff brush skirt which keeps the water from spraying all over you. In addition to the metal sealed bearing, the Karcher uses a heavy rotating spray bar and brass/stainless steel fittings. There is a plastic nut top and bottom that holds the metal parts in the deck. I recommend checking these nuts regularly to make sure they are not loosening. And even though the Karcher is advertised as 15" (the deck is 15") the actual working measurement is closer to 12" based on the length of the spray bar. I assume all competing products have a similar discrepancy.In review, I recommend the Karcher over competitors based on their using higher quality components where it counts most (bearing). And right now they are actually less expensive which make the decision even easier. To maximize the benefit, I recommend using a machine as close as possible to the Karcher recommended max specs: 3200PSI and 2.7 GPM. While lesser specs should work, performance will be diminished and will make the job take longer. And at some point, if the machine is too small (like many of the electrics under 2000 PSI) it may not work sufficiently well to warrant the purchase. As to longer term durability, I will attempt to update this review in the future after I have had the product for a suffient time.

I included several photos of potential interest. The surface cleaner performed well, allowing me to clean about 1,000 square feet of concrete driveway, patio, and sidewalk with no real problem. The infamous large top and bottom nuts that so many reviewers have referred to did finally start to loosen after I had cleaned about 700 square feet. I kept checking the top and bottom nut thinking they would loosen, but they didn't until I was about 80% done with the job, then the one underneath started to loosen. This is a problem if you don't have anything big enough to tighten them. I don't really have anything proper, but I was able to get it tight using a VERY large channel lock (model "460" -- see photo) which is a fairly huge tool that I expect not that many people have on hand. A smaller channel lock tool, the one I'm betting lots of people do have (model 420), was not big enough to tighten it without a lot of marring of the plastic (nylon?) nut. So beware of that if you don't have something to tighten the nuts, or if you aren't brave enough to do some drilling and connect the top and bottom nut with a wire or bolt (etc) like some other reviewers have done. I'll probably do that eventually, but wasn't about to until I could ensure that the unit worked ok. I don't imagine Amazon would react well to giving a refund if you have modified the unit.As far as the operation of the unit, it was quite straightforward and cleaned the surface very well. You can see from some of the photos the before and after conditions. It does give a vigorous cleaning and did remove some of the top layer of the concrete, so, if you're squeamish about that, then you'd probably be better off to just leave your concrete a little dirty. I will not clean mine again for a few years for that reason. I also cleaned a set of brick steps which were very dirty and it did a good job on them, but I spent as little time as possible moving over them to avoid excessively damaging the mortar. I included a photo of the pressure washer I used since I figure a lot of people interested in this Karcher cleaner might have a similar washer. It did just fine with the surface cleaner, and connecting the wand to the cleaner was very easy. Also, an opinion on getting some type of extender for the wand -- I am not a super tall guy, getting up there in age a bit, and I did have to spend a couple hours bent over a little while using the regular spray wand that came with my pressure washer. It didn't bother me a lot, but if you are super tall or susceptible to a lot of back issues you might want to consider that. I didn't want to spend the extra money on an extender, but if someone had walked up to me and offered me one while I was doing the work I wouldn't have turned them down.This cleaner did save a good bit of time compared to spraying the surface with just the regular cleaning nozzles, and it did a much more consistent job. It took a few swipes to get the hang of how much overlap and how long to hover over the surface. Be sure and read the manual which tells you not to stay over the surface more than 2 seconds, but I found that to be a little too long, so I counted as I pulled the cleaner down the driveway, trying for about one second over any given spot. I overlapped about 1/4 to 1/2 on each pass and it seemed to work well, but again, this thing is fairly aggressive with a 3,000 psi washer, so be careful not to damage your concrete. Also, I found it to be a lot less awkward to pull it along instead of push it.I do recommend the surface cleaner, and, except for the loosening nuts issue, I would give it a 5 star -- it is offered at a good price and performs its job. So, if you're a homeowner (etc) and will only be using this for typical homeowner use every couple of years this thing is probably a good purchase. Since I've only had it a couple of weeks, and I've already cleaned everything I intended to clean with it, I can't say anything about its long-term durability.

My husband raves about this pressure washer attachment. He was able to pressure was our entire flagstone back porch within 1-2 hours with this and it usually was an all day affair. Easy to clean, easy to use, and a huge time-saver. The water pressure remained powerful despite adding the attachment. This is worth your money according to my husband. It also looked like a lot of fun to use. I appreciate that it wasn't bulky and that we could easily store it away.