Water Recovery

I hope new truck washers are recovering wash water. A buddy of mine who has a nice setup for collecting the waste water and hauling it away, forgot to check the generators fuel when who showed up but the boys from the water & sewer dept, they were working next door. They told him that wash water was going down the storm sewer due to his berms over flowing. They popped the manhole and told him to drain all the water from the storm drain, I don't know how they knew what was his, even though only a small bit of water went down. Since he was able to collect the suds and had a recovery system set out they only reported him to EPA and told him to write a letter to the city to explain his mistake. They also said if he didn't have recovery they would have contacted EPA and charged him for water recovery from the sewer to the nearest creek/ river ( plus a minimum of $25,000 in fines.) Truck washing ain't as much fun anymore!

He should get fined for not fueling up !!!!!!

I agree. Morons going to the jobsite with no fuel.

I think you guys have completely missed the point, he obviously had fuel with him just not in the generator, in fuel cans. Consider the noise levels of the generator motor and pw motor together. One stops you think you could tell something was missing? He should have noticed the high water level before the city guy, but I guess he was pre-occupied.

The point is that truck washing as we knew it is done. There is going to have to be a whole new generation of truck washers with recovery units or no mobile truck washing. Some fleet companies are beginning to feel the heat and just going to wash sites. So the price of getting into the business just about doubled itself. Good luck and watch out for guys taking pictures while you are working.

Hmmmmmm. A whole new generation of fleet washers who recover. Will it cost alot to recover? I don't know if I could afford the $200.00. When did this recovery stuff start?

What's $200 - you might be on to something, Dave, where are the $200 systems sold? Most of the recover systems out there are pretty costly, plus you have to have containment tanks and a license to haul toxic waste, once you put the recovered water into the truck and a legal dump site.

Don't the talk about that at your pwna meetings?

So, it's raining. You have six of your biggest account's to wash. It's supposed to rain all weekend, like it has here for the last four weekends. How do you pick up all this water? I can't. Would appreciate any advice here as not washing mean's losing some serious money, to me. I do this full time. Been in the fleet washing game for 14 years, I'm fully insured and believe in doing thing's right. This rain is really starting to annoy me and short of bribing the weather gods I'm stumped boys. Any advice would be truly appreciated.

Hey if it is rain water you don't have to pick it up, so if you water gets mixed with it they have to prove which is yours and which is not.

The $25,000 fine would not be for the pressure washer but the trucking company for generating the stuff, the pressure washer would be written up if it was his first offense, then fined a few hundred for a second and the third would cost a few thousand with his equipment inpounded till he pays.

Now why collect waste water when you can reclaim and use that water again? That way you can avoid any waste water permits.

As for cost, make your own system for a few hundred or as you know spend several thousand and buy one but know what your buying.

This whole thing is about money, not keeping the water clean, buy buy buy, spend spend spend so we can be broke broke broke all the time.

Maybe that dude selling out has a good idea after all.

if I was the one writing the ticket you would be the one trying to prove which was and wasn't.

Washing on a single mat would be about the only way without other wise collecting alot of rain water or like Bull said reuse the water.

Guy's we are talking about fleets of truck's, tractor's attatched to trailer's, parked in their dock door's and nobody around to move them in and out of said door's. Washing on a mat in this situation pose's a bit of a problem as we can't move these unit's. Perhap's re-using rain water and all might be it. Any thought's? Thank's guy's your input is appreciated!

Yeah, quit washing vehicles between 8A and 6P on weekdays...use unmarked trucks. Ask trucking company to park vehicles in another area (more secure) for washing appt's.
We started to wash trucks along a fenceline bordering a busy street one morning...within 35 minutes we had TWO city vehicles asking questions! After that incident, we used our older truck with no signage on it and only washed on weekends...WAHLA no heat!
I realize tree-huggers will bristle at these suggestions...unfortunately, the alternative/correction is economically impossible.

Get real. Your the one that causes these problems that make the honest ones look bad. It's really you they should be looking for. You can't afford a cheap recovery system? If no then your not doing much work and or charging right. Sorry to be so blunt , but quit making us honest ones look bad. Also your not protecting your customer from the fines that follow, or yourself.