How do you get better foam from your foam cannon?

Thick foam from your foam cannon?

How do I get better foam from my foam cannon? That is the question we usually hear. Although more foam therefore does not work better than normal light coverage, many people like to spray paint their foam cannon and coat their entire car white. In addition, most people often think that the more foam the better.

However, a snow foam pre wash is made to loosen the dirt and to pull it off the car even before you start washing. If you spray very thick foam, it often sticks very hard to the car, so that it can loosen the dirt well, but then it does not pull the dirt off the car. If you spray thick foam, you should always rinse the car first, preferably with a high-pressure cleaner so that the dirt can already be removed from the car. Anyway, this is recommended.

However, the advantage that you have with a slightly more liquid foam is that if it already pulls the top layer of the dirt off the car when it starts to run down, the dirt under the top layer of dirt is also loosened, which you usually don't when you spray thick foam. So more foam is not always better. It is of course important that you know this before you decide to read on.

Good foam cannon

A bit obvious of course. But it is of course important that you have a good foam cannon if you want good foam. Not only for that, but also for ease of use. A good foam cannon will also always be able to set how much soap you want to use when spraying your foam cannon and how you want to direct the jet. In addition, good foam cannons are also built to last and the nozzles and filters are easy to replace if necessary.

We are the largest importer and distributor of MJJC Foam Cannons in Europe and therefore work almost exclusively with the foam cannon of MJJC. Their reputation for good foam cannons is known internationally by even the most award winning detailers and also supply well known brands so they can sell MJJC their foam cannons as their private label. So there is a very good chance that if you have a foam cannon that resembles that of MJJC, it is also made by them and sometimes a different brand is simply stuck on it. Since we are so familiar with the foam cannons from MJJC, we will use them to clarify everything regarding the foam cannon.

Nozzle

There are mainly 3 factors in the foam cannon that determine how much foam you will get. The first is the nozzle. Inside the foam cannon is a small nozzle nozzle. A 1.25mm nozzle is installed in the foam cannon as standard. However, we also supply these with a spare 1.1mm nozzle in a bag.

The larger the opening of the nozzle, the more water can easily flow through the foam cannon with the disadvantage that you must have a high-pressure cleaner that is strong enough to move enough water so that you get good foam. If your pressure washer doesn't have that much flow, it will be able to make less foam because the water just flows through the nozzle without having time to create foam.

If you install a smaller nozzle such as the 1.1mm, the opening will become smaller, which will result in more foam, with the disadvantage that the pressure washer will now have to work harder to get the water out through the smaller opening. If you have a strong high-pressure cleaner that can move more than 8 liters per minute, we recommend using the standard 1.25mm nozzle anyway. In normal cases you can get perfect results with this. If you do use the smaller nozzle, you may damage the machine in the longer term. If you have a pressure washer that has a flow rate of 8 liters per minute or less, it may be interesting to use the smaller nozzle.

Internal filter

As a second point, the foam cannon has an internal mesh mesh filter. This filter ensures that the foam is made effective. Just think about when you are washing dishes and put your soap in a pan. There is no foam when you put the soap in the pan. If you just let water run on it, you will see a small amount of foam appear. But if you mix water with the soap and rub it with a foam sponge, you will suddenly see a lot of foam appear. This is the same in the foam cannon.

The water and soap mixture pass through the internal filter. The more time the filter has to make the foam, the more foam you get. This is what the nozzle is for. If you use a smaller nozzle, the filter has more time to make the foam.

However, the internal filter is a consumable part of the foam cannon. As time goes by, it will begin to endure, which means it can make less foam. If your foam cannon used to work well and suddenly it seems to do less and less, it is wise to check the filter and replace it if necessary. Since it is a consumable part we also sell these separately so you don't have to buy a whole new foam cannon.

In addition to enduring, these filters, like all filters, can also become clogged. This often happens when you do not have clean water, hard water with a lot of minerals and lime or when you have used bad soap. When these filters become clogged, they are less effective and you also get less foam. Some do not use good soap, or soap that contains wax or other protective agents that clog the filter. We'll get into this in a moment.

Rotary

Finally, there is the rotary knob on the foam cannon with which you can regulate how much soap you want the foam cannon to suck up from the container. When you open it fully, the foam cannon will suck up as much soap as possible from the container to make foam. When you close it all the way, nothing will come out at all. This can be useful for when you have filled your bottle with soap and water and suddenly a lot of foam comes out of the foam cannon. Because you can close the foam cannon a bit, you save product.

pressure washer

As we just mentioned, the high-pressure cleaner is also important if you want good foam from your foam cannon. Usually people look at how many bar the pressure washer has. However, the pressure of the high-pressure cleaner is hardly important. We recommend about 110 bar to use to wash your car. With more pressure you can sometimes damage yourself and 110 bar is enough to remove dirt and make good foam. Almost all high-pressure cleaners are even above 110 bar, so this is often not the problem.

The problem is often that the high-pressure cleaner has too little flow. The more liters per minute the high-pressure cleaner can move, the more foam you will get from your foam cannon. The cheaper models of high-pressure cleaners often only have a flow rate of 6 liters per minute. This is actually too little to be efficient. The in-between models are often around 7 to 9 liters per minute. You will have to switch between the nozzles and see what feels best. Finally, there are the premium high-pressure cleaners, which often move 10 or more liters per minute. These are ideal for making foam and washing your car.

Soap / Shampoo

As mentioned earlier, it is indeed possible to use the wrong soap in your foam cannon. Not every soap is the same and not every soap can be used for the same thing. The best thing is that you just avoid general soaps like Dreft, green soap and the like. We have made a separate blog post about this as it is also a common topic. You can read the blog post about these soaps HERE .

So it is best to choose a specific one car shampoo. Sometimes a distinction is also made between an ordinary shampoo to wash your car with a sponge and a snow foam shampoo. This is because the mixing ratios are often different and because they use a different formula. The soap for the contact wash must be able to slide as well as possible so that the chance of scratches is as small as possible. While with a snow foam shampoo we just want the shampoo to stick to the car, loosen the dirt and then slide off the car together with the dirt it has loosened.

There are also shampoos with protective agents such as wax, sealants or with ceramic properties. However, these shampoos are not made to make foam anyway. The formula in these shampoos is always designed in such a way that they make little or no foam. However, it has another disadvantage and that is that they will clog the internal filter. And when this filter is clogged you will have no or much less foam until you replace the filter.

Therefore always use a good quality shampoo in your foam cannon. We use ourselves Sonax Acetfoam Energy since we think this is a very good shampoo, especially compared to the price. Because it also slides well in the bucket, we can also use it in bulk, making the price even more interesting. If you would like to know if your shampoo is the problem, use the Sonax Actifoam Energy with a mixing ratio of 1 to 10 in your foam cannon. If you still get bad foam with this, then you already know that the shampoo is not the problem and you can look further.

Water

So if you have a good foam cannon with the right nozzle, a new filter and the dial is fully open. You use a good high-pressure cleaner with the right soap and still don't have a good foam? Then it can still be the water you use. The purer the water, the more foam you will get. If you live in areas where the water is very hard due to the minerals in it, you will have trouble getting good suds.

The minerals and lime in the water fight with the soap and the filter in the foam cannon, so you get no or bad foam. The only way you can solve this problem is by using filtered water. You can do this by installing a water filter and using pure water. Make sure you provide enough filtered water for your wash. If you place the filter for the pressure washer on the pipe, the filter may not be able to filter enough water for your pressure washer to pass through. It is therefore best to provide a separate tank with already filtered water that you can use during the wash and then refill it in the tank.

Conclusion

As you can see, it is not as easy to get good foam as it is often thought. Sometimes it can also just be a combination of different factors that prevent you from getting a good foam. For example, a bad foam cannon with a high-pressure cleaner that is too weak, combined with no suitable soap and water that contains a lot of lime. Because it is a combination of problems, you may not get a good foam and you will therefore have to look at all possible causes and improve where you can.

If you've tried everything except installing a water filter and you're still having bad suds, the problem is probably with the water. We can of course understand that you don't feel like installing a water filter system with an extra tank. In that case you can always just add extra soap to your container. If you add more soap you should normally also get more foam so you can avoid the hard water problem.