Questions Galore!

[helloroe]

New to the board, thanks to Kitty at the Clean 05 show (I was the one that had done 9 hours of plumbing and cleaned out 52 lbs of solidified junk from the 4" main line behind my front loaders before coming and was tired of male distributors talking to my husband not me, the actual owner!) I have been reading non-stop since Friday night and still have tons of questions so all help is appreciated. Quick synopsis is I bought a 1,500 sq ft laundry April 1, 2005 with no laundry experience but am learning real quick. Prior owner did no maintaining of machines or rented location in strip mall of 26 tenants, so I am playing catch up.

Machines I have are; 2 Wascomat 50 lb Washers, 4 25 lb Dexter washers, 24 top load all kinds, GE, Whirlpool, etc. 15 dryers total. 5 singles, 5 stacked. 4 are speed queen remainder are Dexter. We are 12 hour days, attended fully and Wash-N-Fold service. Have done lots of painting and cleaning and come a long way yet when I looked at the postings of everyone's pictures I felt I have a long way to go yet.

1-What does everyone recommend to keep the main drains clean? Mine are not tilted correct and I know I need to replumb but want to keep them cleaned out meanwhile without eating away the pipes.

2- Does anyone have or can point to where it states amount of soap people should use. I am tired of mopping floors from oversuddsing and people do not seem to want to take my word or recommended amounts.

3-Does anyone have another source of income in their store? i.e Phoencards, Money wires, etc. How has this worked for them.

4- We have a large senior community and I am considering Pick up and Drop off service. One day a week at first. How does this work for people? How do you do payment if they are not there? Do you carry a scale with you to inform them of the amount due?

5-At the Clean Show they have the trough system and yes, I had never seen it. Does anyone know where there might be an explanation of how to build one ourselves and what to take into consideration when doing so.

I am thankful I have a supportive family and friends to help me and now am thankful to find this board for much more help.

Roe

[Kitty]

Whew...........gotto love the newbies~ Let me go grab a beer and I'll be back to see if I can answer some of these for you.
Glad you joined the ranks of the rich and famous.......

I hope to rank in the rich category some day......

All you other shy guys ~ or GIRLS for that matter post your questions.



Kitty

"If you do not learn something every day. What the hell did you wake up for?" :)

[helloroe]

Kitty,

I am far from the rich part....when does that come? So far I have just joined the grab a glass of wine each night and wonder what did I do to myself!?!?!!? Although breaking even from day one and considering everything we are having to fix I am happy with that.

I look forward to your educated replies. Need all the help I can get.

[Kitty]

To keep individual lines clean may help keep the main line clear. I suggest you buy all the bras at Walmart and continue to do so on a regular basis. Including Free Willies signs all over laundromat would be a suggestion as well.....that may or may not work? The underwires are the biggest culprits to clogging the drain lines. :) I crack myself up....

In addition to keeping the bras off the market you may want to screen the main drain line to keep garbage from draining down and clogging the main line as well.

Personally I have never used he amount of soap the box has said but then I guess I should start to do laundry again? But if I did do laundry I'd cut the amount by at least 1/4 cup, suggest to customers that soap companies want customers to use more soap simply because they want the customer to buy more.....Hispanic customers are prone to oversuds and we always had downey handy to cut suds quickly...

Use every square inch of your store that will bring in revenue that will work in your market. Video games, tattoo sales, gum machines, scales, etc are a few that have brought in significant revenues that I have heard......keep asking. Changes keep accuring in these type of services.


I would highly suggest a wdf service this will take more than a paragraph of a discussion.


I remember our conversation, and if we are talking the same system, what we did was take the floor drain and put a stainless steel pit directly on top of it (factoring in a very slight decline) constructed the hoses to attach and drain. The system never smelled ever........If I remember correctly the stainless pit cost about 1200 bucks to construct. I bet their is a search on this subject....try searching for stainless steel pit.

You guys answer the questions too......more answers the better!

Kitty

[pete f]

what part of Maine are you from? I just guessing out on a limb here..I have only heard or seen the word "galore" used there.
Your questions I will try
Drain lines,.. buy a commercial drain auger from Home Depot. $300-$500
OR just dump acid ( from pool supply stores) down the drain every so often.
Soap; put up signage on your washers as to how much soap to use. Always say 1/2 cup when you know it needs 1 cup. Plan on 3x whatever you write down if anyone even reads it.
The best sources of income seem to be: soap vending, soda/snack vending, games, ie, pacman, etc, phone cards, ATM's
I know many old people can't drive and need services, set up a pick up, delivery sounds like a great idea. but it involves work, and worse, humans. So when you get a route started and the human you hired quits all of a sudden, if you are lucky, then you cancel your vacation to cover. From there it is down hill.
If you thought you can build a trough that does not leak for less then you would not be asking the question?
Welcome to Coinwash.com!

[Kitty]

Is pit and trough the same animal?

[anonymous]

http://www.draintroughs.com/
Tell them you saw their link on Coinwash.com and to become a Sponsor
they range from 300-1500 make what you need

[helloroe]

Kitty, It is not the underwires that cause me issues, it is change and jewelry. The underwires wait until the dryer to dislodge.

Yes Pete, Maine was home until 4 years ago. :-)

The reason I would consider building my own trough is that I have a badly set up place so there would be alot of "unique" sizes and modifications from the normal I think, so price wise it might be better to build it ourselves as everything would be a one of a kind. BUT first I need to understand the system better. I might wait and modify how the place is set up and then put in already built though. Research.

[Kitty]

Ok, I see the trough, and I guess that is what we had even though we called it a pit.

We had ours constructed at the local shop and we do not have trouble with the change or jewlery because the drains dump into the pit and the pit is constructed slightly at an angle above the floor drain where as these items will not usually find their way down the drain as the weight will keep them from the drain lines.

The drains from the machines were constructed to attach directly to the pit from the side of the pit. When we did this pariticular phase of construction we remeoved an old bulkhead of 14tops and replace on bank of tops for neptunes and and replaced the other bank with 5 35lb fronts. It was relatively an easy re-tool we stayed open the whole time.

[pete f]

Kitty, It is not the underwires that cause me issues, it is change and jewelry. The underwires wait until the dryer to dislodge.

Yes Pete, Maine was home until 4 years ago. :-)

The reason I would consider building my own trough is that I have a badly set up place so there would be alot of "unique" sizes and modifications from the normal I think, so price wise it might be better to build it ourselves as everything would be a one of a kind. BUT first I need to understand the system better. I might wait and modify how the place is set up and then put in already built though. Research.

You going to make me guess more? I was born in Maine, lived "upper mid state" (read; above Bangor) for many years. I'm thinking you within 200 miles of that area.
What is the interest in the trough? It is more for bad drain systems, which i get the idea you may have. If you cleaned your drains, and they don't back up now, then you don't need a trough. Every time I bought a mat I had a year catching up on delayed mainatance. Once you catch up, is not bad to keep it up. Drains are not a weekly, or monthly thing, every few years if that. If you got water backing up a trough will be a temp fix, better to use the money and fix the real problem.

[helloroe]

Good guess. I am originally from Waterville, 60 miles south of Bangor. I miss fall and lobsters. Otherwise, Florida is home.

Yes bad drain system, or non-maintained, and inappropriately set up, that I am working on cleaning out one connection at a time. So far it seems to be working. No more water all over the floor all day. (Clapping)

Thank you for giving me hope that once caught up it will not be that bad to maintain. I am lucky in having a supportive husband and parents that help me greatly. My mom covered the counter while my father and I did the 9 hours of cleaning out the 4" main behind all my large front loaders due to they were not draining but pushing the water out the fronts. No problems since cleaning the line out. Unfortunately, they built a drywall wall around the plumbing with no access so I also did some carpentry. I have learned ALOT in three months. I print things off the internet and work on things one at a time. We have come a looooong way already. I know we are doing things correctly as there are no machines down and I have new customers every day that have heard about us.

Here is to more sunny days and less water on the floor!

[Kitty]

To all the woman out there in laundry land.........take notice here!!

Laundry land is not all about WDF, as you can read from the above post this poster, like myself is of the female persausion and is very competent at managing the repair side of the laundromat business.

Helloroe, I love your coment about how your mom and you cleaned out the 4" line while your Dad watched the counter ~ You GO GIRLS!

Welcome Aboard!


Kitty

[anonymous]

Drain troughs will help the front loader get rid some over soap problem,if you have space and want to save a little money,you can use laundry tub to build drain trough,I bought a few from HK,they work ok.
Home Depo has Ridge 380 roder,it is great,they also sell the high pressure drin cleaning kit,it connect to you hose,2 sizes,they cost under $20,work great for old soap,sofner build up.

[pete f]

Good guess. I am originally from Waterville, 60 miles south of Bangor. I miss fall and lobsters. Otherwise, Florida is home.

Yes bad drain system, or non-maintained, and inappropriately set up, that I am working on cleaning out one connection at a time. So far it seems to be working. No more water all over the floor all day. (Clapping)

Thank you for giving me hope that once caught up it will not be that bad to maintain. I am lucky in having a supportive husband and parents that help me greatly. My mom covered the counter while my father and I did the 9 hours of cleaning out the 4" main behind all my large front loaders due to they were not draining but pushing the water out the fronts. No problems since cleaning the line out. Unfortunately, they built a drywall wall around the plumbing with no access so I also did some carpentry. I have learned ALOT in three months. I print things off the internet and work on things one at a time. We have come a looooong way already. I know we are doing things correctly as there are no machines down and I have new customers every day that have heard about us.

Here is to more sunny days and less water on the floor!


Maine is about 400 miles long, 200 wide with Bangor being mid-point, so I had to guess right;) got it from physic.com
Anyway, 9 hours to clean a drain?? You doing all of main street at the same time? Sounds like you cathing up, and with no water you can bet you are ahead of the game now.
Watch the lint trap, it may need to be sucked out to finish the job. You will have to have a sewer pumper truck for that.

[helloroe]

9 hours to clean one portion of the main line. About 12' in length 4" line. The one behind the large front loaders. It is not angled correctly do everything sits in it. Plus not being maintained. So we tried cleaning it out and broke a tool 10' down the line. We then had to cut the 4" line to get the tool back out and clean out the 52 lbs of solidified junk that was blocking 90% of the line.

I am starting with the other main drains this week with the acid from the pool store as you suggested BEFORE they block up completely like the one I worked on.

Okay here is the female side in me, where is the lint trap that I you mentioned.

[pete f]

I should menetion go easy on the acid, it is powerful stuff..
Almost all mats I have seen have a lint trap here in Florida, if you are on a sewer line. It is a cememt pit, maybe 2x3x3 or somewhat like that. The lines from your mat dump into it, then a seperate line goes to the real sewer line to the city. It requires pumping out every so often, and can cuase slow drain if it gets to full. It will be located outside int he ground somewhere, look for something with metal or cement cover over it on the property in the area the main washer lines exit the building.

[anonymous]

My experience with plumbing both commercial and industrial, is that, like many things, if it doesn't get regular maintenance, then it will get you into trouble. For instance you just spent a very long work day cleaning this one out, but how long had it been since it was last augerd out? If you have successfully gotten the drains clean, then I think if you schedule routine cleanings now and again, you won't have that serious a problem. As noted above, having a tool about, and then deciding the every three months or so you run it down the pipe, should minimize the clogging in the future. And of course making provsion to screen out what you can ahead of time will help. And as noted above the acids can be a real issue. dangerous to handle and hard on the pipes.

Signs might help, but my experience is that everyone ignores them. If they are putting their soap in from large boxes, put your own measuring cups up there - on a little chain or whatever, and then it will somewhat limit how much they put in. The ones that are packed in big boxes of detergent are marked, but the mark is way down the cup, and people will fill the darn thing, again as noted above, that is what P&G and Lever Brothers count on. If your water is soft, the make a point on your signs of telling customers, "MY WATER IS SOFT! - USE LESS DETERGENT AND SAVE YOUR MONEY!!" Many people are not aware that this can make a big difference.

And I don't know how to get around this, but many folks are under the impression that suds are what does the work, and they have been this way for years. In defense of the detergent makers, they have reformulated soaps over the years so that they do not make the suds they used to. But educating people is difficult. P&G makes a version of tide used in Europe that does not suds at all, becuase european regs say no suds in the effluent. And it will get here in time too. Water is a resource that does need protecting.

Good luck Helloroe and welcome to the industry.