Power Cleaner Archives - The Lawn Review

We tested out the new Kobalt 600 PSI power cleaner. This power cleaner is designed to wash away dirt and grime from surfaces from just about anywhere. The Kobalt 600 PSI power cleaner is battery-powered with Kobalt’s 40V Max battery series.

Bottom Line: The Kobalt 600 PSI Power Cleaner has all the right components and was well-built. I don’t really have a use for it but I have found a ton of people that do. You can grab it on Amazon or Lowe’s for a great price.

Kobalt 600 PSI Power Cleaner Review

The Kobalt 600 PSI power cleaner was fun to use. While I have tested many, many electric pressure washers in the past, I’ve only used a handful of power cleaners. I have also tested the Greenworks power cleaner and the Worx power cleaner which operate nearly the same as this Kobalt power cleaner.

The Kobalt 600 PSI Power Cleaner isn’t very powerful

At 600 PSI, the Kobalt Power Cleaner is not made to be a normal pressure washer. For regular electric pressure washers, anywhere between 2000 and 3000 PSI is a great range. 600 isn’t very much – but it is much stronger than a normal garden hose.

If you are the type of person to use a power cleaner then you will have appreciation for the amount of power. In previous reviews of power cleaners, I use a power cleaner to wash off pollen from patio chairs, clean off a bike, and do a quick car wash.

I’ve checked out what others use power cleaners for and it is more of the same: cleaning out animal cages, washing paddle boards and kayaks, and on-the go washing.

Kobalt’s 40V Power Cleaner is easy to use

The 600 PSI power cleaner is super easy to use although it is a bit heavy. You can connect a hose to the bottom of the power cleaner directly, which is what I did to wash off patio furniture. If you don’t have a hose you can use the tube it comes with to draw water from any area.

If indoors, it is easy to fill a bucket up with water and draw from that to clean things like bathtubs or showers. If you are outdoors, you can draw water safely from any fresh water source like a lake or pond. These are great use cases to take your power cleaner with you when you go paddle boarding or mountain biking.

The 5-in-1 nozzle tip is also a really nice feature on the Kobalt Power Cleaner. Simply twist the nozzle to change between five different spray patterns. This nozzle tip makes the Kobalt power cleaner even more portable because you don’t have to keep track of different nozzles.

Is the Kobalt 40V 600 PSI Power Cleaner worth it?

The Kobalt Power Cleaner comes in at under $200 over at Lowe’s. If you already own a 40V battery from Kobalt, then I would definitely give this one a chance. If you are looking for a nice alternative, the Greenworks 24V Power Cleaner is pretty dang good as well.

If you are looking for other Kobalt 40V products, check out some of the reviews we did:

Does Kobalt make a pressure washer?

No, Kobalt has not made a pressure washer. The Kobalt 40V 600 PSI is the closest Kobalt has come to making a pressure washer.

Why we review electric lawn tools

We started The Lawn Review out of frustration. We couldn’t find clarity around what type of products were actually good and reliable. All the fertilizers we tried didn’t work. We ended up with a dying lawn, wasted time, and wasted money.

So we started buying and reviewing lawn tools and figuring out which ones were the best. And now we’ve moved onto actually keeping that grass nice and healthy all year around.

We’ve spent thousands of hours building this content for people just like you and me – normal people.

The Greenworks 24V Portable Power Cleaner is a handheld miniature pressure washer that can be super convenient for taking with you on a paddle boarding trip, mountain biking, or even just around the backyard pool.

We got our hands on this nifty little gadget and decided to write up our thoughts. If you want to see it in action, check out our Youtube video review of this power cleaner.

In short, this power cleaner is a really cool tool that I’m sure has tons of uses to wash cars or windows – but isn’t something that I would regularly use. It’s cool and it was fun to play with, but also had a few little things that really annoyed me during our testing.

Otherwise, jump ahead for our in-depth review of all the claims that this power cleaner makes:

GPM and PSI explained
Convenience
Power testing
Battery life
Final review

Greenworks 24V Power Cleaner: Breakdown

The Greenworks 24V power cleaner is a product meant to be used on the go. Meaning it doesn’t have all the crazy motor action used by normal pressure washers. It also doesn’t even require a hose. Yep – let’s explain.

The Greenworks power cleaner is convenient

Frankly, usability and convenience are everything when it comes to a power cleaner. If you don’t have those – well then you might as well be chained to a classic pressure washer.

The first thing I’ll call out about this power cleaner is that it takes a 24V Greenworks battery. No plugs required, allowing you to be ultimately mobile. The 24V battery works in a ton of other light-duty tools from Greenworks ranging from weed eaters to their 24V shop vac

The next great thing about this Greenworks power cleaner is that it can use a variety of water sources. You can plug a hose directly into the power cleaner and get rocking, but it also comes with a 20 foot hose that attaches to it and can draw water from any fresh water source. Simply drop the end of it in a bucket full of water, a hose, a lake, or anything else and get to rocking. Pretty darn cool.

One huge downside to this (and something we recommend for Greenworks to fix ASAP) is that the hose attachment that allows you to suck up fresh water isn’t very long and floats on top of the water. During testing, it frequently would pop out of the water and cut the power cleaner off.

A bobber or weight or something else that could keep this thing underwater would be super helpful.

Nozzle tips on the Greenworks power cleaner

The power cleaner has another unique feature – a snap-on nozzle head with five different options for nozzle angles. You simply rotate the nozzle through the different angles to select the one that’s right for you. Normal watering, 0 degrees, 15, 25, and 40 degree angles are all available.

In addition to the nozzle tips, there’s this neat little soap dispenser that can pop on as well, allowing you to apply detergent or window cleaner to your exterior windows, car, or anything else before doing a full on wash.

Greenworks 24V power cleaner: measuring the power

The Greenworks 24V power cleaner claims to have 600 PSI of pressure coming out of the end of the wand. We obviously put it to the test with our handy PSI meter.

During our test, we found it to actually reach a max PSI of 700. Greenworks is selling themselves short here!

As mentioned earlier, GPM is also an important metric to watch for when buying a power cleaner. Greenworks claims a 0.8 GPM. We tested this one as well, and found that it was slightly below 0.8 GPM – not bad.

When it comes to actual pressure output and the applications you can use this for, the answer is not much. These are great for muddy dirt bikes, stand up paddle boards, car washes, and a few other things. But as far as blasting away dirt from a deck or concrete or really any other pressure washer-type of application, it won’t get you very far. In all honesty, it isn’t much better than most garden hose nozzles.

Battery life and run time on Greenworks 24 power cleaner

This is where the case for the Greenworks power cleaner really breaks down. Up to this point, this was a kind of cool, handy little cleaning tool. But the battery life isn’t great. We tested the run time on this and it lasted for 17 minutes. You might be thinking that 17 minutes isn’t all bad since it will still cover most quick clean-up jobs.

But man, the charge time for this 4.0 Ah battery is over 3 hours long. I don’t know about you, but 3 hours of charge time for 17 hours of run time seems a little…..whack.

In addition to the weak run-time, I found the battery really hard to pull out of its waterproof casing. The design isn’t very intuitive, although I appreciate that they protect it.

Convenient waterproofing but hard to access.

Our final review: Greenworks 24V Power Cleaner

The Greenworks 24V Power Cleaner is a great tool for somebody. But I didn’t find that many applications that I would personally use it for that wouldn’t be covered by either a normal garden hose or a regular pressure washer.

If you have neither, this one can be handy. I personally liked using the Worx Hydroshot better.

But if you’re interested in this one and already have a 24V Greenworks battery – then it’s a great option and is available for a competitive price on Amazon.

If you’re looking for an alternative – check out our review of the Kobalt Power Cleaner.

Why we started The Lawn Review

The reason we started this website in the first place was because we had so much trouble trying to find reasonable, understandable, honest reviews for lawn equipment. And it’s not cheap! After hours and hours of research, trying products and returning them, and messing up our yards – we started this site.

As people who had to learn the hard way, we want you to know exactly what you are signing up for before you purchase a piece of equipment. That’s why we are committed to providing honest, easy-to-understand reviews that mean something.

GPM and PSI on electric power cleaners

GPM stands for gallons per minute. GPM measures how quickly water is leaving the end of the electric pressure washer. PSI stands for pounds per square inch and is a measure of pressure that is being applied out of the electric pressure washer.

If this is confusing to you, you’re not alone. In reality, if you are looking for power, you want both. They work hand-in-hand to deliver water from the machine at a high rate and effective and efficient volume.

For reference, a pressure washer can have a high PSI but a low GPM, meaning it is able to have a high pressure but generally not over a large area. Having both a high PSI and high GPM means that it’s coming out fast and it’s producing a more effective stream.

Likewise, you can also have a low PSI and higher GPM. This is a good ratio for cleaning cars because you get a lot of water at a safer pressure.

Tag: Power Cleaner

Kobalt’s 600 PSI Power Cleaner Review: Is It Worth It?