Most fleet managers already have a washing routine for cars and trucks, but a delivery van is a different job. It runs a tighter schedule, is parked in a loading bay instead of a wash bay, and its exterior collects a specific mix of road film, brake dust, exhaust residue and spilled product from the cargo area. Before you buy a machine, quote a vendor or write a standard operating procedure, you need a site assessment that answers one question: what does this site actually allow? The assessment below covers the items that decide equipment choice, and you can walk the yard with a clipboard and finish it in an afternoon.
1. Vehicle inventory and soiling profile
Write down the number of vans, their height and length, and whether any have a lift roof, refrigeration unit, tail lift or step-side body. Those features create shadow areas where soil builds up and are easy to damage with the wrong nozzle. Then record where the dirt comes from. City stop-and-go traffic leaves brake dust and exhaust film on the rear panels and wheels. Rural or construction routes add mud up the sides and around the wheel arches. A van carrying food, chemicals or animal feed may have residue from the cargo area migrating onto the bodywork.
Also note what is not washable: decals, adhesive advertising panels, corroded seams, older rubber trim, and any area with a repair or a rust treatment. Anything on that list changes the pressure, the temperature and the distance you can work at, so it belongs in the assessment before the first wash, not after a complaint.
2. Water supply, drainage and the standing water problem
Confirm the nearest tap, its thread size, whether it is hot or cold only, and how far a hose has to reach. A yard that supplies only a cold mains tap is fine for most steam and hot-water equipment, because the machine heats the water itself, but you still have to verify the fitting. On the HW02 page the water inlet is a tap-water connection with a 4-point internal-tooth joint, 1/2 inch, which is worth matching against your own tap before ordering.
Then look at drainage. Where does the rinse water go? An oil-water separator or interceptor may be required by local rules, and wash water that runs into a storm drain is a compliance problem in many jurisdictions. Note the slope of the surface, any puddling, and whether the ground is concrete, asphalt or compacted gravel. Standing water around the wheels slows the schedule and, in cold weather, it becomes ice.
3. Power and the electrical survey
Measure the available supply: voltage, the outlet type, the circuit rating, and the distance from the panel to the wash position. A long cable run with a thin gauge gives a voltage drop and the heater will not reach its rated output. For a mains-powered unit this survey is not optional. The fixed unit listed for vehicle cleaning works on a 220 V supply with a 6 kW heating element, so you need to confirm your supply matches before comparing quotes.
Ask whether the wash position shares a circuit with other heavy loads, and whether a residual-current protective device is installed on that circuit. Cleaning equipment works with water, so the protection arrangements are part of the site assessment, not a detail for the electrician to sort out later. Battery-powered units remove the cable question but introduce charging space, battery handling and runtime per charge instead. In the assessment, write down which trade-off the site prefers.
4. Space, access and circulation
Measure the wash position: length, width, ceiling height for an indoor bay, and clearance around the van on all four sides. A high-roof transit van needs more vertical clearance than a panel van. Then walk the route the operator takes. Can the machine be pushed or driven to the position without crossing a pedestrian route, a loading ramp or a doorway? A 1,200 × 800 × 1,200 mm footprint is manageable outdoors, but check the doorway it must pass through, including the handles.
Note where the machine parks between jobs and where the operator stands while working. If the van must be moved twice to reach all sides, that is time you will pay for every week of the machine's life. Tight urban depots are the usual reason a site needs a mobile unit rather than a fixed one; the cleaning equipment range includes driving-style units built for narrow parking areas and indoor garages, which is exactly the constraint a small depot has.
5. Working hours, temperature and weather
Record when vans are actually available. Many are washed at the end of a shift, in low light, or in the cold. That affects three things: heating time before the first job, whether the operator can keep the surface above freezing, and whether the machine can be stored somewhere dry. Note how long a van can be held out of service. If the answer is twenty minutes, a process that needs a long dwell time will not survive contact with your schedule, and you should say so in the assessment.
6. Chemical handling, storage and detergent policy
List what detergents are used today, where they are stored, and who handles them. High-temperature steam and hot-water cleaning reduce how much detergent a site relies on, which matters when a depot has no proper chemical store or when adjacent areas cannot tolerate spray drift. Write down any surface the site is not allowed to treat with chemicals, for example a food handling area or a customer-facing forecourt.
Check storage: does the machine need a lockable, dry, ventilated space, and is there one near the wash position? A unit carried across site every day will be skipped on rainy days.
7. Safety, training and who does the work
Name the operators, and check their other duties. Steam equipment at 160°C and elevated pressure is not a job for an untrained driver, so the assessment should record who gets instruction, how long it takes, and who signs off the first wash. Confirm the safety features you expect to see on a quoted machine: the fixed vehicle-cleaning unit is specified with leakage, short-circuit, high-temperature, high-voltage and water-shortage protection, all of which you can verify against the datasheet rather than accept in a sales conversation.
Also assess the risk to bystanders. A forecourt or depot with public access needs a cordon, and a shared yard needs a rule about who may be in the area while a wand is running.
8. Volume, frequency and the business case
Count the vans, decide how often each one is washed, and work out how many washes a week that adds up to. Compare it with what the current arrangement costs — outsourcing, the labor hours spent with a hose and bucket, or a wash that simply does not happen. Then add the non-financial reasons: a clean van carries the company name into customer car parks, and a body cleaned of road salt and chemical film lasts longer.
Write the number down as a target throughput, for example vans per shift. It becomes the specification you send to every supplier, and it stops you buying a machine that is one size too small or paying for capacity you will never use.
9. What the assessment should conclude with
A completed assessment should not be a pile of notes. It should state, in one page: the vehicle count and dimensions; the soiling profile; the water point and drainage route, with any treatment required; the available supply and the protection fitted; the wash position dimensions and access route; the hours available; the operator and training plan; the detergent policy and storage; and the weekly throughput target. Those nine outputs are what a supplier needs to recommend a machine honestly, and they are what lets you compare two quotes on the same basis.
If the survey shows a tight depot, cold wash hours and a limited supply, the answer may be a mobile hot-water and steam unit that heats its own water. If it shows a fixed bay, a matching supply and a high van count, a fixed unit with a larger tank and higher output will pay back faster. Either way, the assessment comes first. Send your completed figures to the supplier rather than asking for a brochure, and you will spend the first conversation on the machine instead of on the site conditions nobody measured.
