Pricing The Parts For Paralyzed Pressure Washer

A long-time ago I learned that moss grows on the north side of trees. I've heard that is useful to know if you are ever lost in the wilderness without a compass, GPS, cell-phone or Bear Grylls as a guide.

While I've never used this knowledge to find my way through the forest, I have observed that this saying is accurate. Moss does grow on the north side of trees. In our climate, it also grows very well on the north side of buildings and more specifically, the north side of my house.

The moss -- or perhaps it is mold -- is not a very attractive green on my white siding so I recently hauled my pressure washer out of the garage to do my semi-annual house, deck and sidewalk cleaning. There was no moss growing on my deck or sidewalk. They were just dirty.

I have a little gas-powered pressure washer that I bought about 5 years ago from Sears for under $200. It's powerful enough to do what I want done without fear of punching a hole through a window or siding. I've heard you can do that with a lot of the bigger pressure washers if you are not careful.

So halfway through my semi-annual cleaning, a part broke on my washer. It wasn't a terribly complicated part, just a 4-inch pipe with a coupler to hook up a hose. The threads on one end had become stripped and the 4-inch pipe wouldn't stay connected to the pressure washer.

One nice thing about Sears is the fact that the retailer also sells spare parts for practically every tool it carries or has every carried. So off to Sears I went, 4-inch pipe in one hand and the manual for my pressure washer complete with a list of every replacement part in the other.

The customer service fellow in the tool department was helpful, but he had bad news. Even though Cape Girardeau has one of the biggest Sears stores in the country, it carries no parts. However, the helpful fellow told me they could order it. I asked him how much it would cost.

$37.

For a 4-inch pipe and a couple of fittings. Plus shipping and handling. And tax.

He wanted to know if I wanted to order the part. I said no, since I figured that if necessary I could do it myself at Sears.com.

Instead I went to Lowe's. I found one of their associates in the plumbing aisle and showed him the part from my pressure washer. We were able to assemble a look-alike adapter out of three plumbing fittings.

Cost was about $12.

With no shipping and handling. Including tax.

I got the pieces home, wrenched them together and fired up my pressure washer. It worked like a charm and I finished my semi-annual cleaning.

But this incident made me curious.

If a four-inch pipe with a couple of fittings was $37, then just how much would it cost if I wanted to buy every single replacement part for my $200 pressure washer.

According to Sears.com, I would need 14 parts and assemblies to accomplish this including the manual ($18.20) and the decal ($6.60). The engine is not priced with the website instructing users to "call for availability." It looks like the 4-inch pipe that broke on my pressure washer can be purchased as part of the "pump assembly" for $155.94.

That's actually not so bad. The manual has a separate parts list for just the pump assembly. The total cost for the 21 parts and kits required to build a pump assembly from scratch is more than $350, so $155.94 for an already assembled unit is a steal.

I figure that the cost of completely replacing my pressure washer from spare parts is about $447.36. Plus shipping and handling. And tax.

And whatever an engine would cost, if it were available.