Our branch in Frome covers a very wide service area, which includes Warminster. We were delighted to be invited to survey some of the retail outlets within the Longleat House estate for commercial carpet cleaning.
Commercial carpet survey
The first location that required a deep-clean was the sweet shop. This is an area that (for obvious reasons!) endures a very high level of footfall.
When we arrived for the survey, the flooring initially appeared to be a wood effect laminate but, as soon as you stepped onto it, its softness revealed it to actually be Flotex. Flotex is made with 70 million fibres per square metre!
We don’t encounter this type of carpet very often, but it was popular in the past as a kitchen carpet.
It has several unusual characteristics that make it a practical option, such as:
From a cleaning perspective, it presents certain challenges. In a shop such as this, it will tend to hang onto an enormous soil load. Also, because of its density, we need to use a specific machine to agitate the floor as rotary floor machines tend to jam on its velcro-like surface.
Social distancing stickers
This floor had quite a few, worn out social distancing stickers on the floor that the managers wanted to replace, so our first job was to get these off the floor. Thankfully, we keep builder’s floor scrapers in the van for just this type of job…
Using contra-rotating brushes
After we had carried out a thorough initial vacuum, it was time to bring out “Old Faithful”.
This slightly battered orange machine is a contra-rotating brush machine, specifically designed to lift deep-seated soils from within the carpet pile whilst simultaneously agitating a cleaning solution into the carpet. The image below shows the night/day impact of this process…
Traditional rinse extraction
Once the floor had been prepped, it was time to recover all the soil & debris we had made soluble using a rinse extraction machine. On this occasion, we used an Airflex Miniflex. This is a compact professional carpet cleaning machine with more than enough power to tackle this job.
Rinse extraction cleaning is sometimes referred to as steam cleaning.
When hot water is fired out the end of the carpet cleaning wand, it has the appearance of steam. This carpet did not require a particularly high water pressure (in this case, around 200 psi).
Once we had cleaned the floor, it was clear that it would need to be cleaned again. So we repeated the process a second time!
When we had completed the second rinse, it was basically job done. We installed a fan heater to accelerate the drying, cleaned the equipment & headed home.
If you have a commercial space you would like to have cleaned, or have any questions about our services, please navigate to our commercial service page here or use the Contact form.
Thanks for reading!
