Power Washing and Roof Cleaning Forum

Bryan P wrote:

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I like my proportioner much, I'd probably pay double for it. Sure, you could rig something to work, but the Proportioneris bulletproof...the valves are VERY accurate and results are repeatable. It is also extremely easy to train employees how to use it because there's no guess work. I did rig mine with an additional 3 way valve to switch between the soap tank and a soap drop tube I can put in a bucket if I want to use something different.

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 All day long! Just bought 2nd one.

Roof Cleaning Virginia wrote:

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I'm with you Jared. I think I have a total of $10 in mine (PVC). And it's employee proof. We should compare notes one day. I think Art O made his out of galvanized, and a buddy of mine made one out of stainless.

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             No Galvanized here

Many people have built these proportioning units over the last few years. It's actually very common,..just not openly talked about that much. I think it's much to do with the respect people have for Tim Asleton. And kudos to him for being able to market a tool, that helps many.

Chris Tucker was talking about doing it 8-10 years ago and I think it spurred some into going forward with the idea. And I don't blame them,.it's a great idea.

Jeff

There is no law against building our own equipment. I think as time goes buy and we as owners get busier we have less time to build our own rigs.

Brian C Jackson wrote:

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There is no law against building our own equipment. I think as time goes buy and we as owners get busier we have less time to build our own rigs.

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 Hey Brian,.yea,..I agree with that whole heartily,..anyone that's seen my posts over the years knows that I love reverse engineering,.and even engineering using the "wing-it" method.  But I know Tim has been around these boards for a long time and wasn't a vendor,..and still offered up advice the same as many of us do.  Like I said,..on my part anyhow,.it's just a matter of respect not to get into the weeds of the build on a Manifold that was developed for market by one of our peers.  But,..yes I built one as well,..and I would normally be sharing my own build and and ideas openly (As I have with other things) ,..but hat was done through private messages with others that un-selfishly gave me the ideas to build it. 

*I figured it's just a matter of time untill it gets wide open popular to build them yourself,..figured I'd not be part of the onslaught of info. 

Jeff

I aslo believe the proportioner a very professional piece of equipment and I will probably just buy my next one . But I think it's a good idea to share this info with new business start ups that dont have the budget to do an expensive build. I also think this is a good thread.

Here the one i built with my sws skid.

Diamond Roof Cleaning wrote:

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Here the one i built with my sws skid.

-- Edited by Diamond Roof Cleaning on Saturday 8th of April 2017 03:26:47 PM

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 Looks great Mike!

It's interesting to see the number of variations and cost levels. 

Not me I just make a phone call and they build it.

I've purposely not responded to this thread for couple of day to gather my thoughts... but i think I'm ready to share now. You want to know my thoughts: I think its crap to go out and publicly discuss how to violate a patent. Especially here on the general open forum. This isn't some private off the beaten path BBS, this site ranks nationally and this thread isn't even on the private side.

Now let me soften my stance and explain my reasoning;

1) Tim is a very good friend of mine. When he invented the Mainifold, I begged him to take it to market as I knew it was a tool that would help cleaners and revolutionize the industry. I was not an easy task to get him to do this, and sadly from the moment he "put himself out there" there been people walking all over his intellectual property rights and trying to screw him out profiting on what he's legally protected, researched and developed. IN full and fair disclosure, I am not a disinterested observer who is unbiassed.

2) If Jeff W. patented a downstreaming device (which we know he loves) i'd feel the same way about protecting his rights, Also, because since he's a friend, I would try and help him market that product if he was taking it to market. I like trying to help my friends. LIkewise if Art revolutionized the siding industry with an incredible new tool, I wouldn't be out in public forums discussing how to beat his system.

3) It is correct to say that we've always tried to reverse engineer products and do things cheaper, better and sometimes just because we like innovation and doing things ourselves. Its cool, i get it, but I don't think the actual process/and step by step how to guide needs to be discussed on a public forum. If I had the formulation for Dragon Juice I wouldn't be out publicly sharing it, I might give a buddy a PM about it, but I wouldn't go out publicly stating it!

4) I can't help but wonder if we don't (as the NWSA) somehow have some liability toward the Mainifold, the Powerwash Store ( the MFG and distributor) and Tim Aselton (the owner and inventor) for hosting this info.

5) I figure my time is worth about $70/hr (at least thats what the W-2 portion of my compensation says). Running the rigs comes in at well over 2K per day, 365 days per year. As my company has grown, I just don't have the time to build and innovate anymore. I used to build my rigs but now days I can't afford to anymore. But when my company was smaller, I couldn't afford to buy rigs. Theres nothing wrong with building your own stuff. Theres' nothing wrong with tweaking things you buy. Its called innovation and happens in every industry.

6) I know its "just the Mainifold", but let me show this in a different light. What if we were talking about Coke, and I said, here's something just as good as Coke, and here's how you make it, and also used the Coke name during all of my discussions. How fast do you think I would have a team of lawyers suing my AZZ off? There's a reason we have patents and copyrights, to protect inventors and innovators who choose to risk their finances and go to the open market. Any one of us could try and build a proportioning device, but legally we can't say I'm going to build a Mainifold.

As others have stated, Tim has been a long time innovator, participant, and friend to many in this industry. I don't think its cool to target this inventor by name and try to circumvent the way he makes a living. He is much more classy and diplomatic than I am, and probably wont come here to tell you how he feels about this. For example, the booster pumps. Tim doesn't make one single cent from the sale or promotion of any booster pump, yet he spends 10-20 hours per week conversing with people about them, and helping them fine tune their rigs ( even with people without Mainifolds, some even have homemade PROPORTIONING devices.) Thats just the classy kind of guy he is. He firmly believes in his heart its the best delivery system for softwashing.

Thanks for moving the thread Brett. I wanted to do that the other day and you guys bitched. Ray you have the power to move any thread you don't like or think it shouldn't be in the open