"$1,200 for a floor burnisher??? No, I'll just make one." ... And other idiotic quotes that came out of my very own mouth will all be discussed today on the blog.
First I have to tell you that there's a difference between buffing your floor and burnishing it. Buffing is like rubbing your floor with cotton ball kisses while wearing a floral print dress, drunk on lemonade. BURNISHING your floor is like letting six trillion Tasmanian Devils break dance on it.
Buffing doesn't do much of anything by the way. Burnishing will make your floor shine like a dimpled 6 year on Star Search.
Which explains why when I bought my vintage buffer I was less than impressed with the results. I figured it was because I bought a 50 year old buffing machine from a flea market. As it turns out that machine isn't really meant to make a floor shine, it's just meant to clean it. A Burnishing machine is what you need to make your floor so shiny you consider putting orange cones around the perimeter to warn people of the hazard.
I wanted a hazardous floor.
Once I realized this, I of course immediately looked into getting a burnishing machine. They're, like, $1,200, minimum. And generally not made in sizes appropriate for home use unless your home is something that was handed down to you by your great, great, grandfather Lord Bumblebum.
A floor buffer runs at 175 revolutions per minute. A floor burnisher runs at a minimum of 1,500 revolutions per minute. Cotton ball versus Tasmanian Devil. Dull floor versus dangerous floor.
I thought there had to be a way to make a floor burnisher that didn't cast $1,200.
"I mean, $1,200 for a floor burnisher? I'll just make one." Said no one, other than me. Ever.
But I did it. And it kindda worked. And here's how.
I laid VCT tiles in my mud room, kitchen and bathroom for the low, low price of $265 for everything a few years ago. That even included the glue and snacks. I still love the floor. It's soft, comfortable and easy to clean. I love it a million times more than the ceramic tile that used to be down.
But it's taken me a while to get the hang of cleaning it. It has a "wax" finish which isn't really wax like they used in the olden days, it's some type of water based acrylic shiner-upper. This finish means you have to use a cleaner that has a neutral pH. I use an industrial neutral pH floor cleaner that I got at Home Depot.
To clean it, I use my vintage floor buffer with just the brushes attached for a light clean, or with these green scrubbing pads for a more vigorous (Karen's been walking through the house in her chicken shoes again) clean.
But no matter how clean I kept my floor the finish kept getting duller and duller.
That's when I learned about burnishing. A few Googles and I understood my floor was never going to be super shiny unless I either re-waxed it, or burnished it. I do re-wax my floor about once a year, but I wanted something to shine it up in between floor waxings. I needed a $1,200 burnishing machine that has 1,500 revolutions per minute.
After checking the pockets of all of my winter coats, I'd come up with $1.27 and an already chewed piece of gum.
HEY WAIT A MINUTE. My car polisher that I've never used once has 1,500 revolutions per minute. At this moment my brain started to misfire a bit and I almost thought I could Turtle Wax my kitchen floors. Luckily my brain righted itself and I realized I might be able to fit my car polisher with a floor burnishing pad.
Most car polishers are the same. They have high RPMs but not a huge amount of power. They have a soft sponge at the bottom of them that you normally fit a terry cloth bonnet over which you use to polish the wax on your car. Burnish it really.
I thought I'll never know until I try and even worse I'll never be able to get it out of my mind until I try ... so I tried. I ordered these 3M synthetic/natural burnishing pads off of Amazon.
They were a bit big. In fact I could probably turn one burnishing pad into 3 if I was careful.
I traced the size I needed onto the burnishing pad and then cut it out with regular scissors.
Now that I had a burnishing pad that was the right size I just had to figure out how to attach it to my car polisher.
I was really hoping I could use a blow torch and welding mask but spray adhesive ended up being the answer.
I sprayed a bit of adhesive to the foam on the car polisher and a bit onto the burnishing pad.
I didn't need it to stick forever, I just needed it to stick a little bit. Because when you polish the floor you're applying pressure down onto the polisher which basically keeps the burnishing pad from flying off. The spray adhesive is extra insurance.
So did it work??!!
Yes!!!! And No!!!!!!
You can see in the photo above (which was a really hard picture to take by the way) the top portion of the black tile has been "burnished" and the bottom portion hasn't been. So there is a visible difference. So that's the portion of this experiment that came out as a YES!!!!!!
But it took quite a while to do and no one would ever walk into the kitchen and say WOW THOSE ARE SOME HAZARDOUS FLOORS!
The car polisher just isn't heavy enough or powerful enough to burnish a floor the way a real burnisher would. Also, this car polisher of mine is a "random orbital polisher". So it doesn't go around and around really fast, it kind of jiggles side to side and around a bit like a dashboard hula girl. Having said that, it did improve the shine on the floor. It just didn't make them dangerous.
I've now looked into this Makita polisher that doesn't seem to be a random orbital polisher, just a regular round and round polisher. For the sake of experimentation I might buy it to test out for you and everyone else who says things like "$1,200??!!! I'LL MAKE THAT INSTEAD!" from the comfort of their mental health facility rec. room.
In the end I slapped a couple coats of wax on the floors and called it a success because even if the burnisher didn't make my floors as shiny as I wanted it to, it did prod me into waxing my floors. Sneaky burnisher.
When I test the Makita car polisher on my floors you will be the first to know. I have the orange safety cones at the ready.
Jody
I love your kitchen. I lust after your kitchen. Seeing the floor polisher brings back such great memories of coming home from school and my mom had waxed all the floors in the house. I love the smell of floor wax.
Kathy Hartzell
I am still kicking myself that I didn't spring for real linoleum flooring in my beach house...but instead I opted for large hybrid tiles by a major maker that have a little texture to them and look quite realistically like stone, yet happily leave you without the shin splints after a day of kitchen fun. I installed them with help of my contractor.....and love them, mostly.
So one day I spilled something really nasty and got down to scrub it up. Omg, I was convinced the pattern was coming up. Just with my 65 year old self scrubbing!!! I called the company, wrote to them, cried that the product was worthless. Etc etc. the. Stumbled upon my box of leftover tiles....and discovered that my floor was simply unbelievably filthy.......and all I had done with my hot jam spill was clean off the house renovation dirt in a small area.
Fast forward, The texture means it is a b*#%£ to scrub off that dirt, so I brought out my vintage floor polisher and burned out its motor last week trying to use the natural brushes as scrubbers. I applied pressure as it was dancing over the floor. DUH. I needed those green pads, not the polishing brushes.
Why didn't you write this two weeks ago??? I would still have a functioning vintage polisher. That I haven't used in 29 years!!!! I could have mailed it to you for your collection. Now it will have to be a door stop, as was mentioned a few letters back.
Dot
Don't throw those old floor polishers out. They are great for cleaning your wooden deck in the spring!
Cred
I'm wondering if it's possible for the car polisher motor to fit within the housing of the floor buffer? That would be cool if you could retrofit it. Then you would have a floor burnisher that still has the cool retro look with the bonus of a long handle for less back-breaking labour.
Judy O
If you really want a burnisher and don't mind a used one, keep an eye out on eBay -- or janitorial supply companies -- for one. Just for kicks I searched eBay and found a few (at 1,500 rpm) between $350 and $400, without the shipping cost.
Karen
I'd be terrified of what those shipping costs would be, lol. ~ karen!
Patsy
Brilliant Karen. I grew up with helping my mother polish our floors with the old fashioned one like in your picture. In fact, she still has it at home as a doorstop!! I wonder if I put burnishing pads on mom's polisher with adhesive... could I do the same thing??
Karen
I'm afraid not. What your mom has is a polisher, like mine. A burnisher is much stronger and faster. That's why I could never get my floors super shiny with the polisher. ~ karen!
Mary W
I love the look of super wax shiny floors. I especially love how I see the reflection of your cabinets in your floors - just beautiful. It's like visiting the Biltmore Mansion in North Carolina - beautiful and where I would host wonderful parties filled with interesting people. Dreamland beautiful. Just not lifeland real - I love visiting but would rather visit a blog and laugh than get up and clean. Now if you could DIY more hours in my day - more energy in my body - more want to in my soul - that would be something.
Ann
I am with the one that said, she just kicks the cheerios out of the middle of the floor. Our old ceramic floor tiles need replaced. But we are saving it for a bigger project, our kitchen remodel.. Until then, I just try to keep the dirty spots mopped up nightly.
Sia
Star Search!!!!!!
Haaaaaahahaaa
Paula
Karen, I think the floors turned out fabulously!
Christie's on Saturday :)
Judy D.
This is a floor burnisher available for 'rent' at the Home Depot down here in California. Perhaps your store has them for rent also.
http://www6.homedepot.com/tool-truck-rental/Floor_Burnisher/200BU20HR/index.html
Carla
That is pretty cool hut it did tell me it's not available in Overland Park Kansas.
robert
This is so SO weird, in something totally unrelated to you (that is, rewatching gossip girl from the beginning while I read the recaps of the episodes from Nymag where at some point the recaps point out that the floor at Blair's are so "slippery and lawsuit inviting") I haven't stopped thinking for about a week now in very shiny floors and other things that might make one fall, slip or even fall on, and here you are talking about slippery shiny black and white floors. Are you been listening to my thoughts Karen???
Karen
Only sometimes. But not that particular one. That one was just a coincidence. :) ~ karen!
Catt in Kentucky
Love your floors! Did you remove your old ceramic tile floors yourself?
Karen
Yup I did. And there's a post with video proof. ~ karen!
Catt in Kentucky
So impressive!
Wendy W
Rent one? Home Depot has a great rental program. Not sure if they have a burnisher, but they might bring one in for you? Worth a call, maybe. Good luck!
Laura Bee
Whew - I thought you were going to go the Tim the Toolman Taylor way & give the buffer "More power!!" Aaghhh grrr uhgg hh. . .
Debbie from Illinois
Lol!
whitequeen96
I'm really glad I don't care about shiny floors.
I have enough to do just kicking the Cheerios out of my way.
Paula
Lol!
Mary W
I don't even have to kick the Cheerios out of the way, I have my dog Trixie for that - don't even need to call her. She can hear the difference between a Cheerio and a gum wrapper. But I do love to look at shiny floors - look and then walk away.
Lauren
Ditto!!!
GrammyK
I would love shiny, but at my age, I have to look at good pics of them. Love, love the idea of kicking the cheerios out of my way, but they have to take their turn until I can get the other stuff kicked into a pile to pick up with the inimitable picker-upper.
Loren
Ha
Moose
For $30, you can get a cheap air-powered sander/polisher that will do 2,000 RPM. Or you can get a more meaty sander that spins at 20,000 RPM, which might move from "so shiny you need safety cones" to "where the hell did the floor tiles go?" The heads are only 7" in diameter, so it's not ideal, and they aren't going to be as comfortable to use, but for lots of spinny for not much money, what the heck.
Cynthia Jones
Bloody hell, now you tell me why my fabulous vintage floor polisher didnt do squat. I got all excited when you mentioned a car polisher, but then you say it didn't work well enough either.
There's one more option. I have a hand held grinder in the shed. It is small and goes like the clappers. Don't ask me RPM's and stuff like that, I am not even sure how to turn it on without picturing myself grinding my own head off at the stump.
Surely, it could have a burnishing pad whacked onto it and surely you also have a grinder in your shed. Here in Oz you can also buy the finest of hobby grade steel wool. I wonder how that would go on it. I think it is worth a try.
You do it and let me know. OK? I dont know how on earth you are going to attach it to the spinning pad though.
I'm off for a coffee. Hope your weekend brings you some lovely.
Karen
It will. There's the big Christie's Antique Show this weekend! ~ karen
Raymonde
After waxing the wood ceilings and beams in my very old house (and yes I make my own beeswax mixture) I needed to rub that wax a lot to give it a nice glow and to make sure the dust didn't stick to it. Do you know how uncomfortable it is to do that? I mean it's up there, over your head... Well, after trying a few things, I found that I could only use a really light hand held waxer. That meant that I had to compensate the lack of power with a rougher surface to burnish with. Finally, I settled on some rough scouring pads, the kind that are meant to clean BBQ grills. Those pads made the wood shine like crazy.
Yeah... That reminds me it's been quite a while, I should probably give them a quick go over...
Karen
That would have been and insanely horrible job Raymonde! ~ karen
Sandra Brooks
idk my mom used that same model back in the 50s and after she buffed our tile floors we all fell down for at least a week after.
Karen
LOL. ~ karen