waxing tile floors - Cleaning Talk - Professional Cleaning and Restoration Forum

bizi5a · 10-11-2006, 09:56 AM

I need to touch up areas on a vinyl commercial floor with wax. I stripped and waxed the floors 1 yr ago. Now under the rolling chairs are dark circles. How do I remove the dark stains and wax just that area (without doing the whole floor) to make it blend in with the old wax?
Just the same .. I want to strip and wax one room then do the hallway the following weekend. How do you blend the waxes where they meet at the doorway without leaving start and stop marks?

mvwallyworld · 10-13-2006, 07:04 PM

I think you will have a very difficult time repairing the dark circles under the chairs. I would be supprized if there is any finish left on the floor. You may have to strip the floor down and refinish it. You can probably plan on 120 min. per 1000 sq. ft.
Regarding blending the finish between the room and hallway, most good finishes should blend well just by feathering the overlap. You will see the blend for a day or two untill they totaly cure but should be fine.
Randy

Bob · 11-02-2006, 03:11 PM

I worked in a nursing home that believed that no matter what a floor doesn't need to be stripped more than once every 3 years! I've ran into that problem many times over.

What I do is scrub the room and in the affected area only, spray a light mist of baseboard finish remover aerosol. Don't let it sit too long. 30 sec to 1 min max. Run the buffer over it and rinse. Repeat as necessary. It'll remove just enough finish to get rid of the contamination, but won't remove all of the finish so it'll blend in. Then apply your new finish. This also works for deep scratches and stains.

If it's made it's way all the way to the tile and has began wear the tile itself down, what I do is apply an extra layer on that area in between the layers I put on the whole floor. That way it will have double the amount of finish on it thus building that area up higher than the rest of the floor and blending it in. This usually works if the damage to the tile isn't too bad.

If you have a stain on the bare tile that won't come up with scrubbing, put a little ajax or comet on it and scrub. Just be careful not to scrub too much and damage the tile. Rinse the area and continue to scrub the rest of the room.

I hope this works for you. Let me know how it turns out.

PIE DODGER · 11-13-2006, 01:35 PM

HI, IF IAM WAXING CONNECTING ROOMS I USE PAINTERS MASKING TAPE MAKING THE JOIN UNDER THE CONNECTING DOORS WHEN THE WAX DRIES I PEEL OFF THE TAPE AND PLACE IT ON THE NEWLY WAXED SIDE NOW WHEN YOU WAX PAST THE TAPE YOU HAVE A PERFECT JOIN, WHICH WILL BE HIDDEN UNDER A CLOSED DOOR.

**t.peterson** · 11-13-2006, 01:43 PM

Great tip - thanks for sharing

Joey D · 12-22-2006, 10:34 PM

This is what i was taught by a guy with over 40 years in the business believe it or not..
This is for informational purposes only and not to suggest this is applies to every circumstance. This may be usefull for commercial cleaners with multi year contracts for nightly cleaning.

For VCT.
1) Initial strip on the floor has to be perfect. No residual wax or stripper left. Tile to be clean
2)Use a sealer under heavy use areas such as where chairs are rolling over the floor all day or very heavy traffic conditions.
3) If a sealer is used you high speed buff before the finish is applied to get the maximum deep gloss when you apply your finish.
4)four to five coats premium finish

If the floor is maintained properly i.e. dust mopped and damp or wet mopped daily and scrubbing and recoating as per conditions warrent
(monthly,bi monthly,quartly every six monts whatever) you should not have to strip the floor again for 5 to seven years!
(If you use a finish that won't yellow)

What he has used for the past 20+ years and told me to use is Johnsons wax.
I have a busy doctors office that we first refinished 4 years ago
We scrub and recoat 1 per year and high speed buff 1 per month.
The floor looks as good as the first day we refinished.

This is easy for us because we maintain the floors ourselves daily.

Joey D.

l_s07181983 · 12-15-2009, 10:26 AM

I have a very small but busy hospital that I'm pulling my hair out to maintain the floors. I just took this job and none of the floor techs know what they are doing really. They know the essentials but none of them are trainied properly. I've had two in-services but I think that the guy who did it didn't know what he was doing either. I have found some instructions but they all say do to do it differently. I also have another issue. BASEBOARDS!! They were never taken care of in the past and the hospital can't afford to replace them right now. Unfortunately, we are stuck cleaning them. Think 20 years of built up dirt and wax!! So this is an added challenge. I also can't seem to find a happy medium for cut-off lines. If we use masking tape our stripper runs right through, if we use duck tape it sticks to the floor. I've used the blue painter's tape too and nothing seems to help. We've also tried taping down plastic bags and sheets...still run over. I really need some help here. I have four levels of floors to do by february including these nasty baseboards. Fortunately I did find a good method for cleaning them...just really time consuming.

aqualityassured · 01-28-2011, 04:16 PM

Try maintaining greasy restaurant floors. Micro fiber mops all the way!

FloorScrubbersGuy · 02-22-2011, 09:45 PM

If the area is small, instead of getting out the low speed buffer, and slinging stripper everywhere, tape the area off like "PIE" suggests, with a WIDE tape, then use about a half and half mix of stripping agent, on the area, and scrub with a doodle bug and the thin, black, aggressive stripping pads (ask your supplier), rinse the area carefully and apply sealer/finish. Buff the area with a high speed to blend the edges.