Builder’s Tip: Landscape Fabric As Tarp for Power-Washing Pressure washing painted siding can leave millions of unsightly paint chips strewn around a house. And there hasn't been a really good way to pick up any but the largest pieces — until now. When one of my clients was adamant about not wanting any chips around his home, I came up with the following solution. I had planned to lay down tarps to collect the chips when we hand-scraped his house, but the tarps would be flooded by the water during the preliminary wash. Instead, to catch the flakes and let the water pass through, I spread some landscaping fabric left over from another project. We placed the fabric about 6 feet out from the house. Although the water puddled up initially, it passed through the fabric soon after we shut off the equipment. As a tarp, the landscape fabric worked great. It caught even the tiniest particles. — Mike Guertin, East Greenwich, R.I. | 
