Home Pressure Washer

This Karcher pressure washer is about as powerful as required for domestic use, It makes short work cleaning alloy wheels on my car and is good for a quick blast in wheel arches during winter to remove salt deposits, One word of caution, the rotary feature for extra pressure can be a bit harsh on soft materials such as wooden fence or decking so be careful when on vulnerable surfaces. The pressure can be adjusted with an electric button on the lance. Something I find a gimmick really as pressure can be adjusted by simply holding the nozzle further away from the target.

I've had a Karcher K5 for a number of years and it has always worked perfectly. I saw a good offer so decided to upgrade to the K7. The 3 in 1 lance is very handy and means no switching required. I find I use the other lance options more often now as a result. I thought the power control on the lance looked like a bit of a gimmick, but it actually works very well and is required so you don't apply too much power to items like cars or wooden surfaces. The 10m hose makes things a little easier too, as does the longer power cable, both of which are shorter on the K5 I had. The hose reel is nicely balanced and the unit won't tip over as result of being top heavy which was a concern on my old K5. It is heavier than the K5 obviously but it's worth the inconvenience in my option. The patio cleaner works very well and is bigger and provides slightly better coverage than the K5. I use the suction hose to pull water from a water butt and works flawlessly. My only minor gripe is that there's no specific area to wrap/store the power cable as there was with my K5, however I just wrap it around the wound up hose reel and this seems to work quite well. An expensive product, but worth it in my opinion for the diverse range of tasks covered and I find I can complete tasks quicker also.

You need a mains water pressure feed line to the Karcher unit. A decent garden hose reel from B&Q will do the job. The Karcher uses a standard quick release water connection spigot. The Karcher comes with a standard UK power socket and cable ready to go. You just need to connect the retractable water hose on the Karcher to the hand gun unit supplied, connect the selected end accessory and you are nearly ready. One key point I found out by re-reading the instruction booklet is the importance of synchronising the intelligent hand gun to the base unit. You have a 60 second window from switching on the mains power wall socket to switch on the Karcher power switch and finally hold down the + and - buttons on the hand gun. If you do this within the 60 seconds, the display on the hand gun brings up the 3 power modes which you are now ready to switch between using the + and - buttons. The 60 seconds is really important which I guess is a safety feature. I also bought a RCD trip socket between the wall outlet and the Karcher plug for extra protection (personal choice on my part). So, once ready to go, I was amazed at the flexibility (3 power options low medium and high plus different jet configurations achieved by rotating the lance) this unit has. Karcher recommend that you start off on low pressure setting on the hand gun just to clear any air pockets first. Once you have a steady uninterrupted water stream, you can increase the pressure selection using the + button. This is really easy to do in reality. Above all, for those really stubborn grime and weeds issues on poor neglected patios (like mine), the power that this K7 has is unbelievable. On the high pressure setting with the hard clean setting also selected on the lance, my patio was returned to pristine sandstone appearance in no time at all. This thing is so powerful that it just blasts off the years of grime, moss and weeds with no problem whatsoever. The K7 can also be used on the low pressure setting for more