Exterior cleaning in South Brent
South Brent is a small Dartmoor-edge town on the Avon, just off the A38 and about fourteen miles from our base. Victorian terraces, granite cottages and modern estates are finished in Dartmoor granite and painted render under natural slate.
The town sits between moor and farmland, so you get moorland rain on the roofs and farm and road dirt on the lower walls.
Road film on properties near the A38
Houses within a few hundred metres of the carriageway pick up a grey traffic film that people often mistake for general weathering. It is soot, tyre rubber and brake dust, and it sits on top of whatever biological growth is underneath.
It needs washing off with a detergent first; treating for algae without removing the film just leaves you with a clean grey wall.
Moor edge above, farmland below
North of the village the land rises to the moor at Wrangaton and the conditions are wetter and colder. South towards North Huish and Avonwick it is sheltered farmland. The same treatment lasts noticeably longer on the southern side.
Gutters and hedge-lined lanes
Properties along the lanes here get a lot of hedge debris in the gutters, particularly after cutting season. It is a different blockage to leaf fall and it packs harder.
Questions from South Brent
- My wall is grey rather than green - what is it?
- Near the A38 that is almost always road film. It washes off, but it needs a detergent rather than a biocide.
- Does traffic noise mean you cannot work there?
- Not at all - it just changes what the wall needs.
- When is the worst time for gutters here?
- After hedge cutting, and again after autumn leaf fall.