B200752 Scrubber, Gloss Boss 470rpm 18' 3 Wire Cord Red

The following comments refer specifically and ONLY to my experience in scrubbing an ugly dark brown wax buildup off my terrazzo floor, with a Gloss Boss floor scrubber.> The Pullman-Holt GLOSS Boss works very well, more than good enough for a one-time floor refinishing project, and is a good buy at the price. Obviously, if you pay 2x or 4x the price you can get a better floor scrubber. If I were planning to use a floor scrubber several times a year, I’d opt for a more expensive scrubber. But for my purpose it was perfect.> SCRUBBING PADS – If you are tempted to just use the brushes (without scrubbing pads), don’t – scrubbing pads scrub much better, and are much cheaper than replacement brush sets. I first purchased Koblenz scrubbing pads (Genuine Koblenz Scrubbing Pads - 2 Pads and 2 Plastic Retainers (colors vary)), which worked very well. As other reviewers have noted, you just place them on the scrubber brushes and pat them down (there is no way to actually attach them to the Boss scrubber). The brush bristles hold the pads in place just fine. When I left wet pads full of scouring powder paste on the machine without the machine operating (usually while rinsing a just-scrubbed section of floor) the pads stuck to the floor, which was a nuisance. The solution is to run the scrubber in place for a few seconds, then you can lift it and move it without pads falling off.> You can make your own pads for about 1/20th the cost of Koblenz scrubbing pads. Just purchase Scotch-Brite 96-20 General Purpose Scouring Pads (Scotch-Brite 96-20 General Purpose Scouring Pad, 9" Length x 6" Width (Case of 20)) and cut the scouring pads into circles. I used an old Koblenz scrubbing pad as a template. My home-made pads worked great and were more durable than the Koblenz pads.> CLEANING CHEMICALS – I was very cautious because directions on the internet for cleaning terrazzo and marble (both calcium carbonate) warn to avoid acidic or strongly alkaline cleaners (including vinegar). Most cheap floor strippers are acidic. So, I tried Black Diamond Stoneworks Stone and Tile Intensive Cleaner (Black Diamond Stoneworks 679773002063 Stone and Tile Intensive Cleaner Marble, Granite, Slate, Limestone, Terrazzo, River Rock, Sandstone, Brick and Grout) which is supposed to be a floor stripper specifically designed for terrazzo and marble. It worked, probably well enough for a floor with a light wax buildup and staining, but not well enough for my floor. My housekeeper said that professional floor people she knew used Softscrub. I tried one bottle of Softscrub and it worked well, but it gets expensive. I was in my CVS looking for more Softscrub (but they had none), and noticed cans of Ajax at 99 cents each. I then remembered that I had used Ajax and a similar scrubbing machine 30 years ago to refinish the floor when I bought the house. It had worked well.> According to some websites, both Softscrub and Ajax are acidic and neither should be used on marble or terrazzo. If your floor is less than horrible, try a product like Black Diamond Stoneworks Stone and Tile Intensive Cleaner alone before resorting to Softscrub or Ajax. Unfortunately, Softscrub and Ajax were the only products that I found which worked on my very ugly floor, and as far as I can tell, did not damage the floor in any way. If you use either Softscrub or Ajax (or similar products), don’t leave them sitting on the floor any longer than necessary.> APPLICATOR – Of course you can apply a liquid cleaner with a mop, but a sprayer is faster and more convenient than a mop. If you use Ajax etc., you have to add water to make a thin paste. Periodically, you may have to re-wet the paste as it dries out. About the only way you can do that is with a garden-type 1 gallon sprayer (such as Chapin 20000 1-Gallon Poly Lawn, Garden, And Multi-Purpose Or Home Project Sprayer Great For Fertilizers, Weed Killers, And Common Household Cleaners, 1-Gallon (1 Sprayer/Package)). Don’t try a small hand-type sprayer, you need way more liquid than you can easily put down with a hand sprayer.> SCRUBBING – Letting any cleaner “soak” for about 5 minutes softens the wax buildup or other crud, and makes scrubbing much easier. Using a 1 gallon garden sprayer, I sprayed a 3' x 5' area of floor with diluted (as specified on the bottle) Black Diamond Stoneworks cleaner. Sometimes, I took a break and did some related chore for a few minutes while the cleaner softened the wax and crud. Then I dusted the wetted area with Ajax. Then I used the scrubber to mix the cleaner and Ajax into a paste over the whole 3' x 5' area. Then I SLOWLY and systematically scrubbed the floor with the floor scrubber. Note that simple water may have worked just as well with the Ajax – but I had the cleaner already mixed, so I used it. According to some websites warm (or hot) water is better than cold water (which makes sense), but in practice I found that hot water became chilled almost instantly when it hit the cold terrazzo floor.> I found that the best strategy was to scrub an area about 3' x 5', then stop and thoroughly rinse, then scrub another 3' x 5' area. The main reason for doing a small area at a time is that the Ajax paste will dry and harden to a rock-like consistency if you try to do a larger area, and the Ajax “rock” is MUCH more difficult to rinse. Maybe in a cooler, moister, climate you can manage a slightly larger area at a time. But, you can’t really do an area deeper than 3' without having to walk in the chemical paste (and then track it all over the place creating a bigger mess to clean-up). Scrubbing a small area and then promptly rinsing it up also minimizes any damage which hypothetically might be caused by leaving the chemicals on the floor too long.> RINSING – Of course, you gotta rinse off the floor-cleaning chemicals. If you are using a Softscrub or Ajax paste, that’s probably more of a chore than you think. I used old bath towels, but I do NOT recommend that. I strongly recommend a large rag-type mop and a professional janitor-type rolling bucket with a mop wringer. A sponge-type mop would NOT do the job.> TOTAL SUPPLIES – To scrub clean approximately 500 sq feet of terrazzo, I used 1 bottle of Black Diamond Stoneworks Cleaner, 5 cans of Ajax (and one bottle of Softscrub), and 3 sets of scrubbing pads.> TIME – I scrubbed about 100 square feet of floor per session. It took about 4 hours total per 100 square feet (including moving a minimum of furniture, preparation, and cleanup). 100 square feet is an area only 10' x 10'. I know, that sounds like much more time that should be reasonably necessary, but it really took that long. And I still haven’t sealed the floor. Serious advice – think long and hard about it and consider hiring a professional who can do the whole job in an afternoon.> SEALING – I have not sealed the floor yet, but I purchased Black Diamond Stoneworks Wet Look Natural Stone Sealer (Black Diamond Stoneworks Wet Look Natural Stone Sealer Provides Durable Gloss and Protection to: Slate, Concrete, Brick, Sandstone, Driveways, Garage Floors. Interior or Exterior. 1 QT) for the purpose.> BUFFING – If you want a really shiny floor, you’ll need to buff it. Beware that a shiny buffed floor can be more slippery. Some websites claim that lambs-wool pads are best for buffing. I have not buffed my floor yet.> CAUTION – Ajax “paste”, does really bad things to natural wood finishes – even if it is just a light touch or splatter that is wiped off immediately. Moisture can wick up in particle-board furniture and cause the particle-board to swell. Stay at least 3" from any furniture, including kitchen cabinets. If you must scrub closer, then protect the furniture with 2" wide blue painters tape (such as ScotchBlue Painter's Tape, Multi-Use, 1.88-Inch by 60-Yard, 1 Roll). Work quickly, rinse with a minimum of water, and then promptly remove the painter’s tape.> SHORTCOMINGS OF THE GLOSS BOSS – The main shortcoming of the Gloss Boss is that it comes with a straight simple one-hand handle. In certain situations, when the scrubbing pads are getting an uneven grip, the scrubber can “self-propel” right or left on its own, often quite strongly. Better floor scrubbers are equipped with T-bar handles, for a good reason. The slight leverage of even a short T-Bar (and therefore using both hands instead of just one hand) makes a T-bar scrubber more controllable and much less tiring to use. I happened to have a bracket which I could install on the Gloss Boss handle to convert it to a T-bar, which made the Gloss Boss easier to use.> A secondary shortcoming of almost any floor scrubber is that they don’t quite get the very edge of the floor – although the Gloss Boss gets closer than many floor scrubbers. There will be a ~½" to ¾" edge along your baseboards which are not perfectly scrubbed. That’s actually a good thing – if you are doing serious scrubbing, you might just scrub the paint off your baseboards if the scrubbing pad reached that far. If your floor isn’t in too bad a shape, the “dirty edge” may be unnoticeable. In my case I used a Harbor Freight Multipurpose Oscillating Tool (similar to a Genesis GMT15A -Genesis GMT15A Multi-Purpose Oscillating Tool) with a scrapper blade to clean the edges. With a hand sprayer, I sprayed hot Black Diamond Stoneworks floor cleaning solution, several feet ahead (to give the solution time to soften the wax buildup and crud) and then scrapped up the wax buildup and crud.

I read so many reviews at opposite ends of the spectrum. It's great, no it's horrible. Let me qualify my experience by detailing my use.I have engineered hardwood floors. I used to use "Pro Bona" floor cleaner. Good product, so I didn't think twice when I bought the Bona floor "polish." As you have probably read, that was a mistake. Huge mistake. Our floors couldn't look much worse. Wax build up that showed every footprint, dog print smudge as if it was baked into the wax. Disgusting filthy. Bopping around the Internet of things one discovers that I was not alone in my plight. The solutions were to use products to gently strip this filmy wax build up, including the Bona wax remover, which I couldn't bring myself to use since they were the culprit that started this fiasco. I bought windex and kutter klean. Both less expensive than the Bona wax remover. I did read reviews for windex and kutter klean where poor people used these cleaners on their hands and knees, said it worked but it was a lot of time and elbow grease. So I went searching for a consumer friendly floor buffer and found the Gloss Boss, along with a slew of negative reviews. I read reviews all the time and SMH at people complaining about an "App" ...that was free. Before I ordered the Gloss Boss I came to the conclusion that the negative reviews must be of similar type to the "App" reviewers that complain about free. Nonetheless I did cross my fingers. At the same time, I paid $88 for a consumer floor buffer! Are you kidding me! My vacuum cost 3X as much and it's made of plastics. If you don't like plastics people, go buy yourself a commercial grade buffer and you'll get all the metal that you can handle. Me I'm glad I bought this little gem. Huge time saver. No my pads don't fly off, but I have smooth hardwoods. Yes there is no on/off switch. Get over it people, most commercial units don't have that either. Directions weren't great, but again all you are doing is attaching a three piece handle. Easy enough that a caveman could do it. It is light weight. I think that's an attribute not detrimental. Easy to carry. Easy to store. You want heavy? Go for the commercial metal buffer units and open that checkbook or your Apple Pay. As for my floor, Windex worked the best. Spray on leave on for a minute or so, used these little green pads similar to a scotch brite sponge on the Gloss Boss, and went over the surface easily and quickly. Floor was still wet. I chose to towel dry it. Wax build up was gone and no elbow grease. Our nice looking floors were back! If your expectations match the $88 bucks, which is less than two tanks of gas in an SUV and you have smooth floors, you'll be happy just like me.