Husqvarna PW 235R

Introduction

Despite the name, the Husqvarna PW 235R pressure washer develops a maximum pressure of 135 bar. That’s moderately powerful, which should make it capable of more taxing jobs like a good patio clean. This version also has a remote power control, letting you reduce the pressure for more delicate work.

While that’s a good start, this pressure washer doesn’t come with attachments for cleaning patios, or cars for that matter. Instead you get two tips for the lance, along with a foam gun. This washer also has a reel for storing its long hose but, as I’ll explain, it’s singularly annoying.

Design and Features

• Quality feel to the pressure components
• Long hose, short-ish cable
• Incredibly annoying hose reel

Pressure washer manufacturers seem happy to leave customers to finish assembling their products. At least in the case of the Husqvarna PW 235R, it’s a chance to discover some excellent build quality. This is most apparent in the eight-metre pressure hose, which feels bullet-proof, and the various clips and interfaces that link the pressure components together. Many of these are secured with beefy clips, but these require strong fingers to operate.

Other parts of the design are less successful. This washer’s handle isn’t telescopic, because it’s also home to a reel for stowing the hose. Some pressure washers offer a captive reel, where you can just pull out the hose – which remains connected to the machine. Here it’s simply for storage – you have to unwind the hose and connect it to the machine before use, then disconnect it and wind it back up afterwards.

You need to click the handle onto your new pressure washer, then I had to bash away to fit the hose reel spindle in place. The final step is to fit the coin cell battery that powers the radio link between the handle and machine body.

The Husqvarna PW 235R comes with a foam sprayer, and a choice of lance tips. The first is designed to generate a good covering of foam for jobs such as car cleaning. The latter two comprise a rotary jet nozzle, designed for robust cleaning over a large area, and a flat jet nozzle.

Unlike many other pressure washers, the flat jet provided here isn’t adjustable for shape. However, you can control its water flow and pressure with the remote pressure control built into the handle.

Performance

• Terrible hose reel
• Excellent cleaning performance
• Odd noise

This pressure washer’s hose reel might look like a convenience, but I grew to hate it. With robust pressure connectors on either end, the hose was awkward to stow and unreel – much more hassle than a captive reel, and more of a fiddle than simply hooking a coiled, disconnected hose over a hook, as you might do on cheaper machines.

While the Husqvarna PW 235R has a generous eight-metre hose, its five-metre cable seemed a little too short. I was left puzzling where to stow it, as there didn’t appear to be a hook. Only when I looked at my product photos did I notice it’s partially obscured below the hose reel – in fairness, it’s a tidier solution than most, once you realise it’s there.

Fortunately, there’s not much else to complain about here. This machine has stowage for the lance, handle, foam dispenser and two pressure heads, helping to keep things reasonably tidy. It comes on two big wheels, making it easy to move around as you work.

Switch this pressure washer on and it defaults to its maximum power. Coupled with the rotary cleaning head, that’s great for heavy-duty jobs like cleaning a patio, where the underlying surface can withstand a strong water jet. I tested this pressure washer against five others, cleaning a single patio slab with each. It produced the joint best results, as you may be able to tell from slab number three in the image below.

This pressure washer’s rated 135 bar is a little over the maximum we’d recommend for cleaning a car. Fitting its flat spray nozzle helps to reduce the aggressiveness of the spray, however, and knocking the output power down by a couple of settings helped ensure that I didn’t strip off any paint. Used in combination with the foam gun I managed to get a great clean, but I had to use a soft brush of my own to remove more stubborn dirt.

Having variable pressure is a great way to reduce the chance of damaging soft woods, paintwork and the like, and helps make the Husqvarna PW 235R a more versatile pressure washer. That said, I’m not sure I need five distinct power settings – two or three would do. Connected to my power meter, I measured consumption between 763 and 1,630 watts from minimum to maximum power.

This pressure washer wasn’t especially loud in use, but it did make a curious whistling noise every time the motor stopped when I released the handle. This happened regardless of which attachments were fitted, but didn’t seem to be a sign of any problems.

Should you buy it?

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