If your home has bare-surface floors, then you know how easy it is for them to become dull and scratched. The ever-present traffic of guests, pets and unruly children can dull the shine that your floors had when they were first installed. Sometimes, it is possible to pick the wrong products when waxing your floor, leaving them sticky and tacky.
Most of the time, just using a cleaner and microfiber mop, cloth or paper towels won’t provide the result you desire. A floor buffer can easily provide the best solution for any scenario but finding the right hardwood floor buffer machine for your home use can be the most difficult part of the job.
This article has been written to help you pare down the overwhelming list of brands and types of hardwood floor polishing machines for home use so you can find the one that suits your needs. We’ll answer some general questions people tend to have about floor buffers. Then we will provide a brief review of the top ten floor buffers we believe deserve to be in our list of the best buffer for home use. We hope this information answers some of your questions and helps make your choice of a floor buffer for home a little easier.
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Table of Contents
The Top 9 Hardwood Floor Buffer Machines Reviews
The Oreck Multi-Purpose Complete ORB600MW
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The Oreck Orbiter makes it incredibly simple to strip, scrub, wax, polish, and refinish all floor surfaces. It can also deep clean your carpets for added fun. The Oreck Multi-Purpose Complete OBR600MW comes with several different cleaning pads that are available for purchase along with superior cleaning supplies. This great machine is versatile enough to tackle just about any job or floor surface while giving you amazing, professional-looking results each time. Thanks to the unique design of the random orbital drive, cleaning your floors yourself is a breeze. The brush head moves in a random orbit pattern, allowing the machine to easily glide over the floor. This prevents brush marks, swirls, sanding marks, and gouges. This handy machine is so maneuverable, you won’t have any problem operating it. The Oreck Orbiter will bring your floors back to life quickly and easily. The simple combination of the right pad, brush and cleaning product will get the job done, and with a wide 13″ cleaning path it makes tough chores simple and easy.
The Big Green Commercial Industrial Polisher BGEM9000
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The Bissel Big Green Industrial Polisher dry cleans carpet and removes allergens, buffs and sands hard wood floors, scrubs and cleans ceramic tile and grout and scrubs and cleans concrete and removes oil from all floor surfaces. It also polishes and strips vinyl and cleans, polished and protects marble. This handy hardwood floor cleaning machine has easy to use finger control and is extremely versatile and effective for all flooring surfaces. The Big Green promises: no torque, no gouging, and no swirling. It has an orbital drive that dry cleans carpets and removes allergens. It buffs and sands hardwood floors and scrubs hard wood floors, ceramic tile and grout and it even removes oil from concrete and comes with a 2.4 litre tank.
Bissell Spinwave Floor Cleaner
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Did you know, every BISSELL purchase helps save pets. BISSELL proudly supports the BISSELL Pet Foundation and its mission to help save homeless pets. This multipurpose machine is a powerful hard floor mop that scrubs your floors to a shine so you don’t have to. It is safe for cleaning all sealed, hard-surface floors and comes with a handy 28-ounce clean water tank capacity. The BISSELL Spinwave Floor Cleaner also comes with soft touch pads for gentle cleaning on hardwood floors and scrubby pads for tough, sticky messes. The Spinwave Plus model includes an extra set of mop pads, an extra bottle of formula, and bristle brush for sticky messes. The functional on-demand spray allows you to dispense just the right amount of solution onto your floors to help make them sparkle and shine. The one-of-a-kind triple action brush roll has been designed with two bristle types to help improve the cleaning performance.
Oreck Commercial ORB550MC Commercial Orbiter Floor Machine
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Rediscover the hidden beauty of your carpets & bare floors with the Oreck Commercial Floor Scrubber. This great machine makes it simple to scrub and polish all floor surfaces as well as give a deep clean to institutional grade carpets. Most conventional floor scrubbers are difficult to use but not the Orbiter. It has a brush head that rotates with no torque or gouging in a random orbit for easy-to-use fingertip control. Rediscover the hidden beauty of your commercial carpets & bare floors with ease. The Orbiter dry cleans carpet and deep cleans high traffic institutional grade carpets while buffing and polishing hardwood floors. It also scrubs and cleans ceramic tile and grout, concrete and can remove oil stains. It polishes, scrubs, and revitalizes vinyl and scrubs and cleans brick, slate and stone floors. Oreck ORB550MC truly is a versatile machine. Note that the hard floor and tile kits with pad and cleaning chemical combinations sold separately
Koblenz Thorne P820-B Electric Upright Floor Polisher
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This is a rug shampooer/floor polisher that has been designed to last. The cleaning machine from Thorne electric shampoos, scrubs, polishes, and waxes all kinds of floors with professional results and little effort. With a durable housing encasing a powerful all metal motor and full width bronze gears, the Thorne electric Koblenz cleaning machine floor shampooer/polisher is sure to deliver outstanding results time and again. With tough housing that hides a powerful all metal 4. 2 Amp motor and full width bronze gears, the Thorne Electric Koblenz Cleaning Machine hard floor polisher is sure to deliver outstanding performance over and over. It includes one pair each of Scrubbing Brushes, Tan Polishing Pads, and Lamb’s wool Buffing Pad. The twin brushes rotate in opposite directions, providing stability for easy handling and superior cleaning. The two speed settings are ideally suited for shampooing, scrubbing, polishing, waxing, and buffing all your hard floor surfaces and carpets. The Thorne polisher includes a 120oz. Tank, large 12 in. cleaning pads and a 5 ft. power cord.
WORX WX856L 20V Power Share Orbital Buffer/Polisher
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If you are looking to get a professional-looking shine on all your vehicles without paying a small fortune to a body and detailing shop, look no further than the Worx 20V 10” Orbital Buffer/Polisher. It’s 3000 rpms of orbital action leave a smooth, streak-free polish on any surface. The unique steering-wheel handle and cordless design make it one of the easiest machines to use. It weighs less than 5 lbs, so it’s lightweight and easy to manoeuvre. The kit comes with all the extra bonnets you need to get going and clean and polish your floor now: polisher, buffer, and application. Fortunately, this tool has uses well beyond shining up your car. It makes kitchen and bathroom fixtures look brand spanking new. Countertops and floors will be photo shoot ready, and a freshly buffed banister will become the centerpiece to your home’s entryway. To be honest, that extra functionality is nice, but you’re probably buying this for your car so instead of getting your vehicles detailed every so often, you can buff and polish your rides every weekend for free with the Worx 20V 10”Orbital Buffer/Polisher. This buffer/polisher comes with a 20V Power Share battery and charger that you can use to run any tool on the Worx Power Share platform. You’ll save money when you can grow a tool collection without having to buy a new battery every time you buy a new tool.
Malish 17″ Floor Machine Dust Skirt 882917
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For more than half a century, Malish has been a leader in high-quality brush and maintenance products for the floor care, foodservice, and janitorial industries. OEMs to end-users worldwide trust the Malish name to get the job done. The Malish Floor Machine Dust Skirt adapts to a 17″ buffer and allows the machine to run with any dust containment system, creating a dust-free environment when sanding, grinding, and buffing any flooring surface. The design allows flexibility of the skirt shroud so that it is always in contact with the floor. Made with black reinforced nylon, the brush floats on the floor to allow optimal dust collection.
Powr-Flite NM2000 Millennium Edition Electric Burnisher with Power Cord
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Powr-Flite’s new and improved 2,000 RPM Millennium Edition Burnisher features a precision-balanced weight distribution and a patented housing design, combined together for maximum efficiency. Unlike conventional burnishers, the Powr-Flite eliminates the need for a compensating caster thereby providing complete pad-to-floor contact. High RPM and full pad-to-floor contact provides that high gloss “wet look” shine. It comes with a 20″ flexible pad driver that allows full pad-to-floor contact (no compensating caster needed) and has a thumb-activated safety interlock switch prevents accidental start ups. Finally, there is a full-surround, non-marking bumpers help prevent damage to walls and furniture.
The Ewbank EPV1100 4-in-1 Floor Cleaner, Scrubber, Polisher and Vacuum
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The Ewbank EPV1100 4-in-1 Floor Cleaner, Scrubber, Polisher and Vacuum gives you a complete floor cleaning solution. The EPV1100 is suitable for all floor types, including wood, vinyl, laminate, granite and marble. This easy to maneuver design is perfect for kitchens, living rooms, and other medium to large spaces. Constructed with high impact materials that are built to last, the Ewbank polishes and cleans a 9.5-inch path and delivers 2,200-rpm on the contra-rotating discs that are capable of cleaning, scrubbing and polishing your hard floors to a better than new, beautiful shine. The special cyclonic vacuum detaches from the polishing unit for vacuuming hard floor surfaces before or after polishing. There is extra mobility thanks to the 23-foot-long power cord. Other features include a telescopic handle and a butterfly grip for extra stability, a 680-Watt Cyclonic Bagless HEPA Vacuum Filter, and onboard cord storage area. The EPV1100 includes (2) hook and loop backing plates, (3) pairs of interchangeable and reusable microfiber cleaning and polishing pads, (2) nylon bristle scrubbing brush plates, and (1) vacuum head, to keep your natural floors looking beautiful. The EPV1100 is non damaging to delicate floors. For more than 125 years, Ewbank has been providing innovative cleaning solutions for families and businesses. Innovative design, reliability and customer satisfaction are always Ewbank’s top priority, making them a staple in most households.
How To Use A Floor Buffer Without Causing Damage
Are you wondering how to use your buffer machine for hardwood floors without causing damage? The floor buffer is one of the most important refinishing tools you will need to know how to use. A floor buffer can make a bad drum and edger job look good. In order to begin, you need to clean up, before continuing on with refinishing hardwood floors. Any debris, that accidentally gets caught underneath the screen of the buffer can scratch or gouge your wood floor. Not only will this damage your floor but you will have to re-sand the area to remove the marks. Do it right the first time and save yourself in the long run.
For newly sanded floors, you want to place a new 120 grit screen on the flooring, then a white or red buffing pad over it, and then the floor buffer. Be careful as this equipment is dangerous and it is possible to seriously injure yourself or others.
Operating a floor buffer is just a balancing act. Keep the machine balanced and it will remain where it is. All you have to do is simply shift the weight to direct the hardwood floor refinishing machine. Simple! Easier said, than done. Do not try and control your buffer/polishing machine with just your two arms. Whether it’s a 2hp or 1.5hp, the machine will push you right into a corner or wall which could result in serious injury. Remember, these are horsepower machines not human power ones.
Begin by adjusting the handle on your machine to the proper operating height. To do this, release the lock, near the base, where the shaft meets the motor. Adjust the height of the handle to your waist or just below it and then lock it in place. Check the lock to make sure it is firmly locked in place, especially if you notice you are having a hard time shifting direction or controlling the hardwood floor refinishing equipment.
Start in the middle of the room, away from anything that is breakable. Place the handle up to your waist. You want to lean your waist right on the handle but not with enough force to push the machine completely out from under you.
Things to Consider When Using a Floor Buffer
When using a hardwood floor buffer, it is of extreme importance to always keep two hands on the buffer control, at all times. There should be a safety button along the trigger that you will need to push to get the machine running. Squeeze the trigger on the handle and there will be a sudden jerk. Push or the machine will take off on you, possibly damaging your floor surface. Don’t panic! All you have to do is let go of the trigger, not the handle, and the buffer will stop. Take a deep breathe and try it again. Just keep the handle of the machine at waist level and balance the machine in place. Balancing the machine will keep it from running away all over your floors.
Hardwood Floor Buffer Tips & Tricks
How do we keep it in balance? Simply, center the weight of the motor to the base. You can do this by having the handle rest on your waist while using your body to act as a counterweight. You raise or lower the handle slightly to shift the weight. This will cause the floor buffer to either go left or right. You want to remember to move the handle no more than a 1/4″ up or down. Any more than that, the machine will take off on you.
The buffing disc spins clockwise. Lifting the handle will cause it to go right and lowering it will make it go left. When you’re using a buffing for hardwood floors, do a little practice first using the hardwood floor buffer on a sheet of plywood or other scrap material until you get familiar with controlling it.
Buffing or screening is an important step when refinishing hardwood floors. By being careful, you won’t damage or put swirls in your wood floors before the final coat. While the wood flooring is still bare, take the time to practice. You can still fix any mistakes at this point. Besides, you need to wear down the screen for later use.
Getting the hang of it?
Screen the wood flooring as you move from side to side slowly, from one wall to the other, overlapping your passes by half the diameter of the disc. Screen it lengthwise, then along the width. That’s all you have to do. Now it’s time to clean.
When you are refinishing hardwood floors, you can use a floor buffer to do a light sanding pass. Leave all the heavy sanding for a drum sander and floor edger. Use a floor buffer to roughen in between coats. This will ensure that you have a good bonding surface for your new wood floor finish.
Also, you can use a floor buffer to apply floor wax for polishing or to apply stain or just clean. Prevent pain in your shoulders and back from those dreadful hand applications and get a hardwood floor polisher today. So, what are you waiting for? Go out and get a floor buffer, start refinishing your hardwood floors.
General FAQ’S
Are sanding and buffing the same thing?
Sanding takes care of deep imperfections and allows homeowners to change the color of their hardwood floors. Buffing is simpler, faster, less disruptive, costs less and extends the life of wood boards
How often should you buff hardwood floors?
Buffing can extend the lifespan of any floor surface. This will save a significant cost over time. In low traffic areas, you can buff every two or three months. We recommend creating a regular schedule of buffing to ensure your floors are always taken care of appropriately.
What is the difference between buffing and polishing?
Polishing is a finishing processes that utilizes abrasive belts and processes that use cloth wheels with compound applied is buffing. Polishing generates a brushed or lined finish, while buffing removes the lines and creates a bright luster finish.
There are lots of choices when it comes to hardwood floor scrubbers to keep your floor shiny and new. Do your research to determine which machine best suits your needs. We hope this handy summary helps when deciding on a floor cleaning machine and learning how to use it. Until next time, keep cleaning my friends.