Window Cleaning in Cradley Heath

Pavement grit at the front, a green yard at the back

The housing in B64 hands a window cleaner a particular set of problems. Frontages are narrow and give straight onto the pavement, so road grit and traffic film land on the ground-floor glass and the cills directly, with no front garden to cross first. Rear elevations look into a small walled yard that stays shaded and slow to dry, so the back windows go green along the bottom edge of the frame in a way the front never does. A lot of this stock still carries painted timber cills recoated layer on layer, which will not stand up to being scrubbed. And where a former workshop range survives at the back of a yard, its glazing is normally older and in worse condition than anything on the house itself.

• Ground-floor glass and cills opening straight onto the pavement, taking road grit and traffic film head on
• Rear windows facing a small shaded yard, where the frame edges go green, not merely dusty
• Painted timber cills recoated again and again, fragile enough that scrubbing does real damage
• Tipped and settled paving on some older streets, which ground-based pole work does not depend on
• Surviving workshop ranges at the back of a yard, glazed earlier and looked after less than the house

Pure water from the ground and a gentle brush on old cills

Pure filtered water on a pole, everything reached from the ground, with no detergent and no squeegee on the outside, and nothing leaning on painted render or old brick. The pole brush works along the frames and cills, which on this stock is where the visible dirt sits, and on old painted timber we keep that brush light. Where a uPVC frame on a newer house needs a uPVC cleaner, we tell you. On a rear elevation we work the pole in the yard itself, which is tight, so the hose runs out through the entry and never over a boundary wall. Pole water landing in a small walled yard has to go somewhere, so we work towards the gully and away from the entry and somebody’s back door.

• Pure water pole from ground level, with nothing resting on painted render, soft brick or settled paving
• Painted timber cills brushed lightly by the pole, since repeated recoating leaves them easy to mark
• Hose run out through the entry, never over a boundary wall, in a yard that offers no room to work
• Run-off directed at the yard gully instead of being allowed into the shared rear entry

More detail on the equipment and the order of work: our window cleaning method.

Poles, painted cills and tight yards

B64 bookings are grouped on set days, taking in the terraced streets off the High Street, the roads towards Haden Hill Park and Mary Macarthur Gardens, and the post-war and modern estates further out. Front elevations along the High Street and the busier through routes pick up traffic film noticeably faster than the quieter terraces behind them, and we put those on a shorter interval. Rear access is through the entry between houses, so an unlocked gate is all we need and nobody has to be in. The town is about twenty-five minutes from Selly Oak, and a regular booking is set at an interval that falls on those days.

Small-paned windows and the first clean after a gap

Price follows the number and type of windows, and a small terrace is a small number, so this is one of the cheaper things we do in Cradley Heath. Two things push it up. Original small-paned or multi-light windows carry several times the edges of a single sealed unit and take proportionally longer to do properly. And a one-off after a year of neglect needs a second pass to come up clean, so a standing booking works out cheaper over a year than an annual rescue. Rear windows are included on the same visit whenever the entry gate is left open.

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Four to six weeks on the High Street, longer behind it

Six to eight weeks suits most of the terraces here. Anything fronting the High Street or a main through route does better on four to six, because traffic film returns fast on glass sitting a couple of feet from the kerb. Rear windows looking into a shaded walled yard are best done on the same visit, since the green film along the frame edges builds steadily all year and takes no notice of the season.