Which Commercial Floor Polisher is Best for You?

With concrete floors becoming increasingly popular, you’ll want them to be as shiny as mirrors. By hand, this would probably take months, if not years, to achieve such a uniform and shiny surface. Alternatively, you could hire some equipment from a floor cleaner hire like Concept Flooring Technology, who will deliver their tools and machines to your doorstep.

This guide outlines the main factors that you need to consider when looking to hire a floor polisher. Whether you need a floor polisher for a multi-story car showroom or for small warehouse spaces, the ideal floor polisher is out there waiting for you!

What Are Floor Polishers Used For?

Floor polishers use rotating heads with particular attachments to scrub, polish, and buff floors. In this sense, they can be viewed as big sanding tools for concrete flooring. These are especially useful in large commercial spaces where a lot of surface area needs to be covered quickly.

However, floor polish machines have a broad range of applications aside from polishing. They can also be used to strip surfaces. Whether it be that your floorboards need to be stripped of their old wax, or that you need to remove paint or wallpaper glue from walls, floor polishers will do the job. They’re also used to burnish a floor, which allows light to reflect from the floor with greater ease by levelling the surface to an increasingly finer degree.

Saving Money With Floor Cleaner Hire

Hiring a floor polisher is a great idea for many reasons, one of which being that it reduces long-term costs. This is because the actual use of the machine doesn’t use a lot of harmful chemicals and doesn’t need too much labour.

More significantly, the polishing process makes surfaces more durable which reduces their likelihood of cracking, chipping and scratching over time. This reduces the amount of maintenance, and potentially the amount of replacements, that will be required in the future. This is especially true for particularly large commercial spaces where repairing or replacing large sections of flooring can be disruptive to your business.

How Many Rotating Heads Do You Need?

Depending on your aims, you’ll need to think about how many rotating blades you’d like your floor polisher to have. For smaller grinding jobs and for places that are hard to reach, a single-headed grinder is a good option, although it’s not ideal for polishing because it offers less even weight distribution. If you need a bit more coverage but you’re still in an enclosed or awkward area, a dual-headed grinder polisher is what you need.

Then there are ‘planetary’ floor polishers, made up of either three or four heads. 3-headed floor polishers grind the floor quicker and they’re much better for polishing as they distribute weight more evenly. If you’re looking to grind and polish a particularly large area, a 4-headed option is great as it has very large floor coverage.

What Kind of Area Are You Using the Floor Polisher For?

Another important factor to consider is what type of area you’ll be using the floor polisher for. If the concrete you wish to treat isn’t a level surface then you may first require a dry machine with fewer heads to aggressively grind down risen areas. You may secondly wish to use a wet machine with more heads as they’re better at levelling surfaces to a very fine margin.

If the area has a lot of awkward places that are more difficult to reach, then an edger machine is also a good idea. This is more lightweight and typically uses one smaller head. It may also have a straight edge to allow you to run the polisher closer against the wall.

This factor also depends on the type of finish you’re after. If you want a rougher finish where you can see the aggregate then you may want a polisher with fewer heads. If you’re after a well-refined, smoother finish then you’ll want a polisher with more heads.

Dust Extraction

An important consideration when choosing a floor polisher is that grinding concrete floors produces large quantities of dust. Some ‘dry’ models store this dust in a specific compartment whereas ‘wet’ versions have dust extractors and use water as a lubricant. Extracting dust properly when using a floor polishing tool is important because dust particles contain silica particles which are bad for the lungs.

Which Consumable Attachments Will I Need?

Resin Bond Diamond Tooling: Otherwise known simply as ‘polish pads,’ these can be used as a good starting point when smoothing flat floors. The bond is important as it keeps the diamond in place whilst it grinds surfaces. It also wears at a slow rate, allowing unused crystals to surface, making the machine last longer. Pairing the correct bond with the appropriate working material is crucial here.

Dust Skirts: Dust skirts create a seal between the floor polishing machine and the dust collection machine. This means that no dust escapes from between the two, allowing for a more efficient and cleaner grinding experience.

Metal Bond Diamond Tooling: These pads are more suitable for medium to hard levels of surface grinding. Because they grind and polish more aggressively, they’re ideal for removing thick coatings. Like with resin options, the bond wears down to expose new crystals but this type of polishing pad also uses multiple types of diamond crystals for the most effective surface grind.

You Might Also Want a Grout Cleaning Machine

Generally, grout cleaning tools come with either an oscillating or a reciprocating saw. This movement allows the tool to get further into nooks and crannies and to work at particularly hardened or built-up areas of grout. This is important if your floor uses tiles as the grout between these tiles will need to be replaced before the whole surface is polished.

Health and Safety

It’s also important that users understand the health and safety risks involved with using these types of heavy machinery. As mentioned, the dust produced by grinding concrete, which potentially contains silica particles, is bad for your lungs so it’s a good idea to wear a mask. Another health problem to keep in mind is hand arm vibrations. Using heavy machinery that vibrates quickly over a long period of time can lead to long-term physical disabilities. Wearing some form of buffer like a thick pair of gloves reduces this risk.

To ensure that everybody can use our machines safely, they’re delivered with the accompanying P.A.T. certification and sticker, electrical and fuel safety sheets, and hand arm vibration information. We can also set the equipment up for you and show you how it all works if you’re not yet confident using floor polishers.

Choosing the correct floor polisher is an important first step to getting your commercial flooring to look top-tier. To do this, you need to understand your requirements so this guide has outlined the main factors that need to be considered. The key is getting the right balance between the type of floor you’re looking to grind and polish and the physical dimensions of the polisher, such as its overall size and the amount of rotating heads it has.

At Concept Flooring Technology, we’ll have the most appropriate floor polisher for you. If you have any questions, or if you’d like to hear about any of our other services, then don’t hesitate to get in touch by calling 01494 485952 today!