Placed a small order to Cobb's.

I spoke to Ray at Cobbs today, very nice and helpful guy, he recommends a product of theirs which I forgot the name to boost powermax which surprised me because from what some of you are saying, sounds like powermax don't need any booster, I guess he's referring to 2 bedrooms section 8 housing with 8 family members live in it ? No disrespect meant but you get the picture.
I seriously think that no matter what you use on certain carpets conditions, it just won't clean it 100%, but for me if the cleaning solutions can save me from doing more spot cleaning, I'm all for that, I hate spot cleaning, don't like to get too close to nasty carpets and have to scrub spots with scrubber that sometimes splash solvents all over my hands, yuck.

recent pre sprays I tried , on a scale of 1-10

Bio- Break = 6

Judson Juice =6.5

Procyon = 7

Soils an Oils = 7.5

Clean Free = 7.5

grease eater =8

Slop n gooble = 8

cobbs powermax = 9

Grease Eraser 9.3

Extreme Clean= 9.4


Rating purely based on cleaning ability, not taking in to account cost or smell or it's green or not or PH leval.

Lets here your comparative review of recent pre sprays, you've used.

it's been awhile since we had a real good pre spray thread

Nasty business were in ehh. I remember my son complaining because we had a job that he called  "picking up man "


Sure sounds like powders are the way to go.

You sure have done some experimenting.

Andy Mc wrote:recent pre sprays  I tried ,  on a scale of 1-10

Bio- Break = 6

Judson Juice =6.5

Procyon = 7

Soils an Oils = 7.5

Clean Free = 7.5

grease eater =8

Slop n gooble =  8

cobbs powermax = 9

Grease Eraser 9.3

Extreme Clean=  9.4


Rating purely based on cleaning ability,  not taking in to account cost or smell or  it's green or not   or    PH  leval.

Lets here your comparative review of recent pre sprays, you've used.

 it's been awhile since we had a real good pre spray thread

We actually agree on this one, based solely on cleaning ability.

I would put the Clean Free a little lower down and I haven't experimented as much, but the Extreme Clean is my heavy hitter in that category as well....has been for a long time.

dp1 wrote:

Jeff Brown wrote:So what is the ph stuff and where do you get it?

Hi Jeff, apparently we're talking about 2 different products here, AC is talking about a product called ph10k from chemtex and that's ph 10, the others are talking about powermax from cobbs, that's ph 11 for the nasties and apartments and such.

I think its higher then 10, has to be with the way it cleans. This stuff is the ultra power pre spray for the nasties, not a light soil cleaner. It requires no scrubbing just 10 min or so of dwell time and you can just leave the fels bar in the van, strongest stuff I have used by far.

I want to try it,


Mispec, Have you tried grease eraser? It's darn near equal to extreme clean but wont make your eyes water, or burn your nose hairs.

Extreme clean is great but eats my hands and dries them out, way more expensive then cobbs and not that much better. Cobbs can be used daily on anything and not to worried. But ya extreme clean will clean nasties but so will powdered flex with citrus solv.

Andy Mc wrote:I want to try it,


Mispec,  Have you tried grease eraser?   It's darn near equal to extreme clean but wont make your eyes water, or burn your nose hairs.

It has been years since I tried a sample of it. I decided about that time to stock only chems that I can find local to avoid the shipping expenses. That is how I ended up with Extreme, but I do not like the physical effects it has on me. Having glaucoma, my eyes are often very irritated on their own from the drops and cleaning with Extreme just makes matters far worse for a couple of days.

Unfortunately, my largest customer had it specified in the contract, so I have to keep using it until the next contract.

Your contract specified a specific detail of the cleaning products to be used Rob ? Wow that's weird, never heard of that detail of a contract for a cleaning company

dp1 wrote:Your contract specified a specific detail of the cleaning products to be used Rob ? Wow that's weird, never heard of that detail of a contract for a cleaning company

It was a first and only for me as well. The Facilities Manager was the former owner of a large construction company...which happened to clean carpets as well (flood damage mostly). The Extreme Clean was his "go-to" prespray and so he insisted that it be used.

I tried to slip an alternative by him once, but he recognized a different scent and cried foul. He didn't complain about the appearance at all, just that it didn't smell the same. What can you do, but honor the contract?

what a flipin idiot, no wonder he got out of the carpet cleaning business.

Just tell him how stupid he is and that your a better cleaner then he ever was or could hope to be, and that you don't need any instructions from him on how to clean. Does he tell you how long your wand stroke needs to be too??

dp1 wrote:Your contract specified a specific detail of the cleaning products to be used Rob ? Wow that's weird, never heard of that detail of a contract for a cleaning company

our hospital account was matrix all fiber only. they did the research and decided on it. we could use only that in all areas no pre spray.

but that was a hospital and they want to know whats being used in their facility because something else could affect patients

I use Cobb's powermax on restaurants and rat nasty's and it eats stuff up almost immediately. Probably not the most healthily pre-spray out there but I also live in the deep south and people around here don't really care about green cleaning like other parts of the country like the left coast and I think this comes from the gold miners who used mercury to separate gold and polluted the rivers.

I think it was asked, but the ph of PowerMax is 10. I just got my order yesterday.

I have been using Cobbs Powermax for several years now. It has been my main pre spray that will handle 99% of everything that I clean. No boosting with anything.