Received my karcher foamer attachment last week and played around with it a bit, not as "clingy" of foam as I had hoped.
I was using 1 fluid ounce of CG maxi suds to 10 oz water (bottle held about 11oz). It was quite sudsy, but it all ran off fairly quickly and didn't give me the several minute dwell I was hoping for.
I pulled off the pickup tube and bored out the passageway a bit that the venturi draws the soap through. My drill bits measured it at about 60 from the factory and I slowly worked my way up to 35. I don't know the units, some standard drill bit system I suppose. It was quite small from the factory.
This did give me a lot more draw, it emptied a full bottle in about one pass around the car instead of about two passes. But it still wasn't that clingy of foam. Next I sawed off the tip of the foamer so I could reach the venturi passage with my drill bit. Sawed off just after the passageway reached full diameter again (just before the nozzle looking end piece). I bored that out to about 50 IIRC (I knew I should've written the numbers down..).
End result - fairly high throughput of quite soapy mixture that does not cling to my car very well.
I consider however that I have not failed but rather learned two ways to modify my foaming attachment for operation that I do not like
So, my next shot in the dark is going to be to fill in the venturi with JB weld and bore through again. I'm going to go with a smaller than stock bore through the venturi (my smallest drill bit of 60, I believe 55 was stock). For the vertical bore for the passageway that draws in the soap, I will start small again at 60 and slowly work my way back up. My hope is that I'll end up with a slower flow overall with greater soap ratio, probably with 60 through the venturi body and ~40 in the soap drawing passageway.
I don't think that the autobrite lance contains any black magic, I assume it is just simple mechanics at play and I just need to understand better how to control the variables. The only other thing I can think of is if there is some turbulence introduced in their system somehow, like a passageway with ridges or spiraling flute.
Anyone with insight in this stuff have any tips on how to get the results I'm after?
I was using 1 fluid ounce of CG maxi suds to 10 oz water (bottle held about 11oz). It was quite sudsy, but it all ran off fairly quickly and didn't give me the several minute dwell I was hoping for.
I pulled off the pickup tube and bored out the passageway a bit that the venturi draws the soap through. My drill bits measured it at about 60 from the factory and I slowly worked my way up to 35. I don't know the units, some standard drill bit system I suppose. It was quite small from the factory.
This did give me a lot more draw, it emptied a full bottle in about one pass around the car instead of about two passes. But it still wasn't that clingy of foam. Next I sawed off the tip of the foamer so I could reach the venturi passage with my drill bit. Sawed off just after the passageway reached full diameter again (just before the nozzle looking end piece). I bored that out to about 50 IIRC (I knew I should've written the numbers down..).
End result - fairly high throughput of quite soapy mixture that does not cling to my car very well.
I consider however that I have not failed but rather learned two ways to modify my foaming attachment for operation that I do not like
So, my next shot in the dark is going to be to fill in the venturi with JB weld and bore through again. I'm going to go with a smaller than stock bore through the venturi (my smallest drill bit of 60, I believe 55 was stock). For the vertical bore for the passageway that draws in the soap, I will start small again at 60 and slowly work my way back up. My hope is that I'll end up with a slower flow overall with greater soap ratio, probably with 60 through the venturi body and ~40 in the soap drawing passageway.
I don't think that the autobrite lance contains any black magic, I assume it is just simple mechanics at play and I just need to understand better how to control the variables. The only other thing I can think of is if there is some turbulence introduced in their system somehow, like a passageway with ridges or spiraling flute.
Anyone with insight in this stuff have any tips on how to get the results I'm after?
