I am doin the carpets in a resturaunt next week and the owner wants me to hit up the tile in the kitchen real quick too. I have turned down several other offers to do the same thing, and I begining to feel that money is passing me by! I have a Cimex and a good feeling that it could clean the tile...but i dont want to strip it, just clean it. Any suggestions as to what brushes/pads i should use, and what kind of chemicals?

I haven't done this in commercial setting but have added this service onto a couple of my residential jobs with great success.

I clean the carpets with cimex and DS. Simply drain the remainder of cleaner in the tank, replace with mix of oxyblaster from magic wand. I switch to the brushes. Scrub in and let it dwell a good 15-20 minutes. Vacuum up with a commercial shop vac.

Then rinse with water.

Comparatively speaking, it takes about twice as long as doing a carpet of same size due to dwell and vac time. But its a simple add on since you already have the machine on site. I've gotten in the habit of always offering this service whenever practical.

I'm sure someone here can recommend a stronger cleaner. I like the oxyblaster because it isn't too nasty and you can simply give it a second shot if you find a stubborn area. Just a warning, be careful in residential settings of cabinet bottoms and any wood trim. That shouldn't be a problem in the commercial side.



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Thanks for the info! Its good to know I dont have to pass up on this for future jobs!

For the kitchen tile get an appropriate degreaser designed to attack animal and vegitable fats. Apply it to the tile and allow it to dwell 15 to 20 minutes and scrub with your brushes and vac it up. If you get into tile and grout on a regular basis you may want to consider a high pressure clean and capture system.

Now you know,

Pete

Suggestion: spray the solution on the tile, then clean the carpet, then scrub and rilnse the tile. No down time. If the carpet takes longer, spray the tile 15-20 minutes before you complete the carpet.

I'm always thinking of ways to save time!

How about greased lightning as a degreaser? I have a similar job i need to quote for a rest. in a hotel this week

Thanks!

Joe

I like Mark's idea. Give the floor some dwell time to help dissolve the grease. I've done some restaurants, and there is serious grease that may need 2 cleanings to really clean up well.

Your Cimex will need the stiff ceramic tile cleaning brushes Rick sells, not the softer ones for carpet. We got a set and they work ridiculously well.

I learned a lot from reading John Rupich's board - there is a link to it above (labelled 'Grout') They are pro's there and can give you tons of good advice.

Make sure to wetvac up the goo you will produce, so it doesn't sink back into the grout.

Acid cleaning probbly won't be all that useful in a commercial kitchen, since if they know what they are doing they probbly have epoxy grout in the joints anyway, and epoxy doesn't need acid and won't respond to it anyway. But it needs alkaline degreasers just like the tile does.

Charge more for the tile than the carpet - it is easily 3-8 times more money, but you may wanna reduce it while you're in 'learning mode'.

Would a citrus based cleaner such as CitraPure work?