Rick (and anyone else interested)
I have a new boss (long sotry) and he currently uses a porty for extraction and is doing more and more resty work. I have tried to explai OP and encap. He needs to talk with someone about converting his rotary into pad/encap cleaning.

since I do not own nor use one (rotary)...can this conversion be done and can he talk to you Rick about doing it?

Using a rotary is exactly how I got" my beak wet" with padding and encapping.There is two driver plates that came with my rotary unit;one is totally flat with little gripper nubs,the other has a brush ring around the perimeter leaving the interior of said driver empty so it can accept a smaller bonnet.

Now the only driver I wound up using was/is the flat plate.Get yourself a black scrub pad,the type used for stripping vct.It is very course and rough,which is exactly why you need it.Take the black pad and put it under the rotary/flat driver combo.Then take a cotton OP pad (that you ordered from Rick G.)and put that under the black pad.Your order will be rotary with flat drive plate attached,the black pad to drive and cotton OP pad to black pad.(rotary,flat,black.op)

The reason you need the black pad is two fold; It helps hold the cotton op pad better than the flat driver,all the while not chewing up the OP pad,Also,it provides a better/smoother ride between the rotary and carpet.Now you can pad,in a sense,with out purchasing one before you see what it might do for you.Keep in mind,that it won't be an exact replication or example if you will,of a true OP clean but it will get you in the right direction.

Now to encap; take aforementioned rotary and flat driver and slap a FiberPlus pad underneath it,drop Rick's juice thru the unit and there you go.Again bear in mind that you will have to actually go back over each area a few times in order to try and mimic the scrubbing capabilities of the big "yella".

This is exactly how I was introduced to both before purchasing either a cimex or a OP machine.Have fun!
Patrick

Hi Phil,

Right on with the black pad to drive cottons. Just the standard driver will tear the pads up otherwise.

Many have talked about encapping with a rotary. It will get the job done although not as fast as a cimex or large OP machine.

By the time you try to convert a rotary to an OP you are better off buying an OP. There is no easy cheap way to do it. The shaft on a rotary doesn't have to handle the op action which is very hard on the shaft. Thus you would kill it without convering everything.

Jeremy

Patrick and Jeremy nailed it.







Rick Gelinas
rick@excellent-supply.com

Thanks. I did not mean to imply he wanted to convert his machine...I needed how to use the one he has. Thanks again.

Tips for rotary scrubbing:

First of all, get a solution/shampoo tank, a pad driver, and some FiberPlus pads for the rotary machine. My favorite way to run a rotary machine is to do a criss-cross pattern. Run it straight up and down the section you're cleaning vertically. Then go side to side back and forth across the section horizontally. Make sure that all your passes overlap, and avoid dispensing too much solution from the shampoo tank as your scrubbing. This criss-cross pattern is effective and can be fairly quick. It ain't a Cimex, but it'll get 'er done.







Rick Gelinas
rick@excellent-supply.com

Rick, 2 more ?s please;

1) Regarding the fiber pads, do they "absorb" well enough? I ask because these are resty carpets that have had bad techs working the floors...we can extract as often as we need...but want to put these accounts into encap routines. I have not use fiber pads ...yet...so I do not know how well they will perform under these circumstances.

2) Can YOU provide the pad 'driver" once Mike (my boss) calls you to give you the model # of his machine?

Yes, I can get you a pad driver.

The instructions I gave above are for ENCAP cleaning, not "pad/bonnet" cleaning (I forgot you were wanting bonneting info). With pad/bonnet cleaning, you can perform the same scrubbing technique, however you would use pads/bonnets on your machine instead of the FiberPlus pads. The FiberPlus pads are not designed for absorption, they're simply used for scrubbing (they produce excellent agitation). With pad/bonnet cleaning you would pre-spray a small section (100 sq ft or less), and then you can use the same criss-cross pattern I described above to scrub the carpet using damp pads/bonnets.







Rick Gelinas
rick@excellent-supply.com

We have been using a rotary for pad cleaning for 11 years now.

I have found if you use a pad drive one size smaller then your machine and use a glider when using pads there is no need for black pads and it is more flexible. This way is also better on the pads.

Thanks so much for the insights. Do blue, green, or brown pads work between the pad driver and the cotton pad as well as black pads? With black pads is the "regular" stripping pad better or the open weave/"hi productivity" pads better? I would assume the weave affects how it grabs the cotton pad. I had switched to a Malish Sure-Lok pad driver for my 175/300 but hadn't tried a pad in between so was eating through lots of pads. Had pretty much switched to blended "bonnets" or high profile cotton bonnets for absorption.
I use the criss cross pattern mostly, sometimes in confined areas I use overlapping counterclockwise circular/elliptical pattern as well. This in an effort to get on all sides of the fiber. Was just curious about thoughts on the use of shampoo tank with bonnets. Often I will lightly prespray carpet(hand held 48/64 oz. sprayer)lubricate carpet, then clean carpet by dispensing majority of solution via the shampoo tank(1 wet pass, then 1 or 2"dry" pass). Similar to use with a pad, is this a waste of time? I mostly do this on resi cut pile/frieze with pre dampened pads. Usually after I've done my north/south passes, I do my east/west passes with "fresh" clean damp pads tring to pickup soil, also figuring with the elapsed "dwell" time I'm getting more cleaned out.
One last question. I'd been looking/thinkabout the Malish Orbo/Lok driver, it gives a rotary a orbital motion. It is for floor sanding, but was wondering if with velcro on the face how would that work on carpet? Any advantages?
Sorry so long.