Get the Karcher & upgrade the hose in time AVA still fairly new over here and as you alluded to they don’t seem too brilliant at customer service right now.

I’ve got the K5c & very happy with it so far my K2 was with me for around 4&1/2 years without any issues (bought refurbished from Karcher warehouse for around £50) until I sold it on for £50 😊 and new owner is still very happy with it

 

AVA are a brand who appear to push superior quality as the reason for the price but from what I've seen on here quality is hit or miss

I'll just stick with my spear and Jackson effort for under £100 and use and abuse it without a thought in the world about it

 

Reading the posts over Ava I would say no.

Me personally 40 plus years with Karcher… now my K7 has been back I think six times under warranty and they still can’t fix the Bluetooth connection (not needed but not the point).

I really would be looking elsewhere, or am I just unlucky with a Friday Karcher ?

 

In the Uk, Karcher or Kranzle. Warranty and servicing won’t be beaten.

I’ve had two Karcher K7 compacts and they are fantastic machines, never had a problem with either.

I changed to Kranzle K10’s (had 2) and now a Quadro and they are even better, build quality and power. However Karcher K7’s were excellent.

Go with the Karcher Compact though. The ‘full control’ stuff is nonsense to go wrong.

 

That's exactly what I would say and absolutely agree with the straight forward machine.

If I didn't have a compact (or two), I would be hunting down a 5 or 7 asap before the are unavailable, they're not on the Karcher site and OOS all over.

 

And just to throw a spanner in the works.....

https://www.detailingworld.co.uk/threads/pressure-washer-£150-mark.437731/#post-5860662

Plenty of £££'s "saved" to get a good hose etc.

Choices, choices

Andy.

 

And just to throw a spanner in the works.....

https://www.detailingworld.co.uk/threads/pressure-washer-£150-mark.437731/#post-5860662

Plenty of £££'s "saved" to get a good hose etc.

Choices, choices

Andy.

I’ve heard good things about that Parkside brand stuff.

 

Had my AVA P60 for a couple of years and it’s never skipped a beat. Really well engineered and designed. I have to say I hate anything Karcher having had several just stopping working or developing internal leaks and they always seem cheaply made to me. I even used a Bosch washer in preference to Karcher for a long time before I discovered AVA.

 

I think I'm going to settle for the Parkside one, seems decent power and will be better than my Ferrex one that just conked out. At that price point and considering it's guranteed for 3 years, I wouldn't mind if it conked out at year 4 mark. At least will give Ava more time to develop themselves into a trusty brand.

 

I bought the Parkside one, brang it home, opened it up and it seems all good. However, when I tested the pressure I was slightly disappointed, given it advertises MAX 170 PSI and 500 L/H, I was expecting it to be punchier than the Ferrex one, but this felt exactly the same but uses an extra 0.2 KW of power (so going to cost me more electricty). I then opened up the book and it said the nominal power rate is 115 PSI and 330 L/H. The key thing is the water flow rate is pretty low, it is worse than a Karcher K4. Given it cost me £140 including the patio cleaner, I wasn't impressed (almost double what my Ferrex one cost me). So have now returned it.

Having used my friends Karcher K2, I was surprised at how good quality the hose is, in comparison to the crappy Lidl and Aldi ones. Yes it's not the best hose but definitely better.

I think I am going to go with a Karcher now.

 

Thanks for posting as this is helpful for anyone who's thinking of getting the Parkside one.

Andy.

 

Take it you didn't see this recent thread which mentions the operating pressure against the maximum quoted pressure

https://www.detailingworld.co.uk/threads/parkside-phd-170-b2-lidl-pressure-washer.430985/#post-5860847

 

Thought I would weight in on this, having bought a P80 about 2 years ago, which so far has been solid.

AVA looked really good 2 years ago, they started to setup with UK resellers, I think at one point Halfords were stocking them and they had a lot of good deals to try and break into the market.

I went for Ava because:

• Kranzle was OTT for my use
• Karcher quality has fallen off a cliff
• They advertise Right to Repair, will sell you parts to fix it yourself - I am tired of throwing away useable products that just need a spare part (looks at wife's SAGE coffee machine). Comment parts are hard to get is true though, but they in theory will sell you what you need example for my P80: https://support.avaofnorway.com/hc/en-gb/articles/10284272639890-Part-Drawing-Evolution-V4-P80
• P70/80 were high power, need the POOOWWEERRRR for cleaning the patio, B&Q pressure washer outgoing was limp for snow foam.
• Hose was high quality anti-kink and came with reel on the washer for easy setup/storage
• Karcher fit for generic accessories

So down the road, I can report:

• Product is solid, so far, its an absolute pleasure to use compared to £150 options I had before.
• Pressure is immense, cleaning patio/drive and of course car is trivial now.
• Hose is very high quality
• They have pulled out of the UK a lot. All initial resellers stopped, Halfords stopped (idea of buying nozzles or accessories when I need them went away). I won't use the B-Word but the change in import/export etc and leaving the EU seems to be a factor. I assume they upset all the resellers they signed up, or as speculated above simple can't supply.
• They do stock on Amazon, prices are RRP high, no sales in last 12 months unlike the year before.
• Customer services do reply
• Service kit for P80 has been out of stock for 2 years - I just managed to order one this morning so I can at least get 10 years of my 20 year warranty - if they last that long.

Would I buy one again?
At the 2022 prices, they were a great option, the P55 was often <£190 on Black Friday or special, I paid I think £330 for my P80 - not the £510 its now on their website for.

At today's prices, and with complete lack of resellers in the UK (no competition, you pay the RRP on Amazon for what you need if you want their parts), questionable ability to supply spare parts then I would say no look elsewhere for sure.

Not unhappy with what I got for what I paid, especially now I have the service kit finally on the way (hopefully!) so I have what I need for it to I hope last 5-10 years, but I would say not a good investment now in the UK (Might be different in Europe where you can order parts without borders)

 

Thought I would weight in on this, having bought a P80 about 2 years ago, which so far has been solid.

AVA looked really good 2 years ago, they started to setup with UK resellers, I think at one point Halfords were stocking them and they had a lot of good deals to try and break into the market.

I went for Ava because:

• Kranzle was OTT for my use
• Karcher quality has fallen off a cliff
• They advertise Right to Repair, will sell you parts to fix it yourself - I am tired of throwing away useable products that just need a spare part (looks at wife's SAGE coffee machine). Comment parts are hard to get is true though, but they in theory will sell you what you need example for my P80: https://support.avaofnorway.com/hc/en-gb/articles/10284272639890-Part-Drawing-Evolution-V4-P80
• P70/80 were high power, need the POOOWWEERRRR for cleaning the patio, B&Q pressure washer outgoing was limp for snow foam.
• Hose was high quality anti-kink and came with reel on the washer for easy setup/storage
• Karcher fit for generic accessories

So down the road, I can report:

• Product is solid, so far, its an absolute pleasure to use compared to £150 options I had before.
• Pressure is immense, cleaning patio/drive and of course car is trivial now.
• Hose is very high quality
• They have pulled out of the UK a lot. All initial resellers stopped, Halfords stopped (idea of buying nozzles or accessories when I need them went away). I won't use the B-Word but the change in import/export etc and leaving the EU seems to be a factor. I assume they upset all the resellers they signed up, or as speculated above simple can't supply.
• They do stock on Amazon, prices are RRP high, no sales in last 12 months unlike the year before.
• Customer services do reply
• Service kit for P80 has been out of stock for 2 years - I just managed to order one this morning so I can at least get 10 years of my 20 year warranty - if they last that long.

Would I buy one again?
At the 2022 prices, they were a great option, the P55 was often <£190 on Black Friday or special, I paid I think £330 for my P80 - not the £510 its now on their website for.

At today's prices, and with complete lack of resellers in the UK (no competition, you pay the RRP on Amazon for what you need if you want their parts), questionable ability to supply spare parts then I would say no look elsewhere for sure.

Not unhappy with what I got for what I paid, especially now I have the service kit finally on the way (hopefully!) so I have what I need for it to I hope last 5-10 years, but I would say not a good investment now in the UK (Might be different in Europe where you can order parts without borders)

Really awesome breakdown, thanks so much for the invaluable info.

I was very tempted to pull trigger on P60 EVO for around £350 mark, but I decided against it given all the supply issues and sky high prices now compared to before.

If I had known about Ava back when you bought it, I would have bought the P80 in a heart beat.

But speaking to retailers, they kept telling me they expecting stock in April now, but said they think it will probably be longer as it's not the first time Ava have given them a wrong date and pushed it back (I suspect this feeds into why bigger retailers like Halfords pulled out, they can't afford to mess around with low volume suppliers). Ava themselves told me they would restock a whole bunch on the first week of March on their own store, but that date long passed and I have been checking daily but no new machines were added.

With that all in mind, I somehow managed to find an epic deal for a K5 + Patio Cleaner for £250, direct from Karcher with 6 years warranty. Seemed like the more sensible buy this time around. I guess when it conks out I can consider Ava again.

 

Oh forgot to add, the P80 has a massive inrush current, suspect it needed more design on the supply side to stop that.

The spec says it's 2800W but all the people popping fuses were using extension leads, myself included. In Europe a Shuck is a 16A plug, so less problems - UK being 13A its on the limit and when you add an extension lead (voltage drop) you can't escape P=VA and if you lower V you increase A and pop the fuse.

The washer has a slow blow fuse in the plug it seems, nearly always the extension cord fuse will pop - and I was using 2.5mm^2 blue artic cable not something from aisle 5 in Tesco.

Looks like they stopped selling P80 now in the UK, as long as your into a mains socket its ok but it is a headache when you want to wash the drive - plan to solve with a longer hose extension to leave washer in garage socket.

 

I really like the look of the AVA - particularly the hose reel and the fact it is a better hose and turns with the user.Really sounds like the Ava could be a good product but a headache short term. Maybe I will stick with the Karcher K5 as of now - about to pull the trigger on the newer version of it so will be with the K5 premium Smart Control version. Would anyone suggest I am wrong and should give the P60 Ava a go? The P80 sounds like it has it‘s own problems popping fuses.

 

Personally, no i don't think you're wrong keeping with Karcher

AVA came on here all guns blazing with new models and improvements over Karcher and whilst yes, they were, there were lots of issues reported, some build quality issues and then the tripping the power on certain models, which in today's age is a definite no from me...

 

I have just bucked the trend here and purchased the P60 Evo - following the review on the Forensic Detailing channel about the P80. I couldn't justify the P80 cost for what I wanted so plumped for the P60.

I have a Karcher K3 already but I have left that in France so that I don't have to keep carting a PW back and forth each time we visit.

Expected delivery of Tuesday or Wednesday this week - will pop up a quick review once I get my grubby mitts on it .

 

Good for you. I'm sure There's a few of us on here have AVA and IMO they're decent machines. I know of others who have them and don't have issues either. I've a P55 and not had any problems with it.

Yes there have been some issues hopefully you've got a good one.

Problem as with most things particularly online people jump on the negative and that's what gets posted (don't mean just on here) and those like myself who have one with no issues people don't remember those comments only the negative.

It doesn't seem that long ago even on here people were advising to stay away from Karcher, not to touch it with a barge pole and buy Nilfisk but nowadays Karcher seems to be the recommendation over Nilfisk.

As I say hopefully you don't have any issues let us know how you get on.

 

You won’t regret it. Far more durable than the yellow rubbish. All parts are DIY serviceable and an excellent warranty.

 

I would check your water pressure first to make sure it's enough for one or the other.run your tap to a bucket for one minute and see how many litres are there. X by 60 to get your litres per hour and check litres per hour for each model. That's dictating my next purchase unfortunately but think it will be the smart p50 for me. Similar water usage to a K4. Hope this is some use mate.