Sans Souci Solar Clean

This solar clean was in the Bayside Council suburb of San Souci, located not far from Sydney’s Botany Bay. The roof height of this house is 8.2 metres, almost 27 feet, being a sheer drop of this distance on the western side, where the largest array of solar panels are installed.

These particular panels needed cleaning badly as they were contaminated with lichen which could be seen easily from the ground. This means less power generation.

The owner, quite rightly, recognised the hazards of doing this work and contacted us to do it for him. Most homeowners cannot do this job safely as they do not have the safety equipment or training. In order for customers to understand, we have made this more of a safety post of recent work.

Extra Hand Solar Clean are experienced, fully equipped and trained to climb roofs and work safely. We pulled out all stops to ensure this job was done to our usual high standard and in the safest manner possible. We also wanted to ensure there was no damage to this recently refurbished roof.

By wearing a Safety Harness, and attaching to an Anchorage Line, we can work “In Restraint”. This means we improved our balance, meaning minimal sudden shifts of weight onto any one point of the roof, potentially damaging tiles. This also meant we could not get to any edges where we could actually fall, by simply adjusting our Rope Adjuster.

Further to this, our ladders have special attachments at the base to ensure they are secure and level (and cannot damage tiles), plus we secured them at each level with a special attachment to the guttering.

Even though the winds had started to pick up during the day, we had nothing to fear and were able to safely complete this solar clean project.

In respect to the actual solar panels cleaned, the west side, as previously described, had a bad case of lichen. Unfortunately, it had taken hold of these panels, fortunately we successfully removed this lichen. Some residual damage occurred to the panel coating however, as a result of extended lichen adherence to the surface.

The other side of the roof, not having much lichen in the beginning, was cleaned successfully with no obvious long-term damage.

Whatever the case, the owner will see improved solar power generation.

This solar installation was approximately 7 years old, by cleaning at least every two years, the lichen will not be able to take hold in the future, protecting the owners solar investment and maximise power generation, whilst reducing power bills to the max.

We would also recommend you do not attempt this work unless you can do it safely, as in only one moment, and a lapse in concentration, can result in an extremely serious life changing incident.

Learn more about our solar cleaning and contact us today.