Clean Your Sealed Floors With The Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop
Clean Your Sealed Floors With The Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop
Wood floors, in spite of their strength and durability, are quite particular about the cleaning methods that can be used on them. Take using water for instance. Ideally, one would assume that since water is the universal cleaning solvent, you can liberally use it on wood without worry. However, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Wood is hygroscopic by nature. This means that, depending on its moisture gradient with its surrounding, it will either absorb or release moisture from the wood tissue. Actually, one of the main threats to wood floors is water damage, which leads to issues like cupping, crowning, or warping of the installation. As such, one needs to carefully control the amount of water that is used in the process – which is why models like the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop have grown in popularity.
What about steam mops? Well, when water itself is an issue, hot water will definitely kick things up a notch. Steam mops are used for deep cleaning installations like tile or vinyl floors, but when it comes to wood, they can wreak havoc on the installation. They can easily lead to warping, distortion, and irreparable damage of the wood floor.
The chemicals used for the task also come into focus. Working with harsh chemicals that dull the finish or damage the wood tissue itself can cost you loads of funds when making repairs or even when you’re forced to replace the affected boards themselves. With wood, it’s actually insisted that you work with products that have specially formulated for these situations, such as the pH neutral cleaning agents. Popular DIY solutions, from vinegar to lemon-based solutions, can ruin your wood floor.
As you can see, there is a lot that goes into the mopping process. In this review, we will look at the actual tool for the task, the mop. However, unlike the conventional yarn cotton mops that have been around for ages, we will focus on a relatively new entrant into the industry: spray mops. In particular, we will focus on one of Bonas leading models, their Wood Floor Spray Mop, and the value that it brings you.
How The Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop Aids The Cleaning Process
- Get more done with less effort
The traditional approach – from getting down on one’s knees to scrub the floor, or haggling around with a bucket and mop – takes significant time and effort. Whether you’re a homeowner simply looking for effective cleaning tools around the household, or a professional cleaning contractor tasked with taking care of residential and commercial establishments, having a convenient tool like the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop that reduces your workload goes a long way. With the spray mop, it is safe to use and quick. The spraying action dampens the floors and wets the mop, and you then wipe the target surface in moments. This is quite handy in making the chores at home less cumbersome, and enabling professional cleaning contractors to work on more installations within short time frames.
- All-round cleaning
Spray mops are used for different kinds of messes. From dust to dirt and spillages, you can get rid of them with the spray mop. Whether you’re after picking up dust from the floors – as works with the microfibre pad attached to the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop, or require additional moisture during those wet mopping incidences to remove stubborn dirt from the surface, and even when you’re working with specialised cleaning agents added to the spray mop’s cartridge, you will be in a position to ensure that the floor receives the much-needed care. By mopping up those liquid spills left behind on the floor quickly, you will be able to tackle accidental spills at a moment’s notice without much prep work being required.
- Works for all ages
Spray mops are usually designed to be lightweight – easy enough for everyone to lift. This means that you can get the kids involved to help you out with the cleaning, which is particularly handy when teaching them about responsibility in the household. It’s much easier to run the mop over the surface compared to lifting the heavy vacuum, and the kids will be more comfortable using the spray mops compared to lugging around a bucket containing loads of water. The spraying action also means that you won’t have to worry about the little ones making splashes all over.
- Quick cartridge changes
The user-friendly design of the cartridge adds to its positive attributes. With just a press of a button, you can remove the cartridge from the unit. Proceed to refill it with water for your preferred cleaning solution, then push it back into position. The audible click that you’ll hear will be a confirmation that the cartridge has been properly secured in place on the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop.
- Comfort grip
You wouldn’t want to be in a situation where you’re working with a mop that’s uncomfortable to use, right? Well, with the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop, that won’t be a cause for concern. The soft cushion grips of the unit, plus the foam handle, make it comfortable to use, adding to the ergonomic design that contributes to the popularity of the mop.
- Comes with a retractable hook
Are you big on keeping things organized? Then you’ll love the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop’s retractable hook. This particular feature makes it simple to store the mop, freeing up space for your other cleaning accessories. Once you’re done with the mopping process, simply hang the tool up on a wall, keeping it out of the way of your other cleaning equipment, and reducing the amount of storage space required.
- Reduces water usage
For the environmentally conscious, working with spray mops is a plus, given that they are kinder to the planet as a whole. Instead of working on the floors with the conventional mop-bucket approach that results in lots of water being used, units like the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop are effective with significantly less water.
With less water being used, chances of creating streaks on the surface being worked on are also cut down. This is also safer for the family, especially those with toddlers and the elderly around since wet floors being about the risk of slip and fall accidents. Given that tools like the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop result in minimal solutions being used in the process, the floor being worked on dries faster, in turn reducing the risk of slippages and protecting your loved ones.
Popular Cleaning Products Used With The Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop
Granted, the mechanical cleaning action of the microfibre pad attached to the mop is powerful. After all, it’s one of the major benefits of working with the material. You can dry-clean the surface, with the particles being yanked off the floor and the strong electrostatic force locking them within the pad. However, cleaning solutions also come into focus when wet mopping the floor, giving that extra chemical action that breaks down the gunk to make it easier to remove. These are topped up in the cartridge of the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop. Let’s delve into some of these, all from the same brand.
- Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner
This is the main formulation that you will find being used with the spray mop under review. Here is what you get from it:
- Ready-to-use formulation
Here, you don’t need to mix the cleaner with water and struggle to balance dilution ratios. Whenever you want to clean the floor, simply grab the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop, top up the required amount of cleaner that will be sufficient for the task, and proceed to clean the floor. Add more product as needed as you spray and mop the area. What’s more, it is a fast process, given that there won’t be any rinsing required after the mopping, as the product itself will dry fast, enabling you to allow traffic back onto the area much sooner.
- Safe for wood
With wood floors, you can’t afford to take any chances. The pH of the chemicals that will be used to clean the installation is key. After all, you don’t want the wood tissue getting damaged, or the finish coats that had been applied becoming dull. The pH neutral Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner has been developed for this particular task. It is tough on the dirt and grime that will be on the floor, breaking it down with ease, while being gentle on the wood itself. You get to give your floor a thorough clean while maintaining its finish coat and protecting it from discolouration.
- Residue-free mopping
Get rid of the dirt and grime that is on the floor without leaving behind any residue. With this formulation the surface is left clear, without any sticky material that would have ended up being a dirt magnet. That way, the floor that has been worked on gets to remain cleaner for longer.
- Easy on the environment
The environmental impact of cleaning solutions that are used is a key factor to consider when selecting cleaning solutions to work with for the mopping process. After all, you don’t want to be in a situation where toxic fumes are being released into the indoor airspace, putting your loved ones at risk. With the Hardwood Floor Cleaner, you won’t have to worry about that. This particular formulation comes with GREENGUARD Gold Certification.
What’s GREENGUARD Certification you ask? This standard is used when assessing building products and furnishings, and their impact on the indoor air space. This cuts across the board – from the construction materials, electronic equipment, medical devices to the very furniture used in the household. For instance, GREENGUARD Certification criteria has actually been the basis for the LEED credit since 2002 for low-emitting furniture, and a metric used in instances such as acquiring office furniture. The Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner on the other hand has the next tier of certification “GREENGUARD Gold”. This is a stricter standard that also takes into account health-based criteria, especially for products that will be used in environments that insist on having to have very low total VOC emissions like schools, nursing homes, labs, hospitals, clinics and other healthcare facilities. So, by choosing to work with the Hardwood Floor Cleaner in your Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop, you will be getting the premises clean whilst creating a healthy indoor environment for your home, office space or institution, reducing the chemical exposure and protecting your family members and colleagues. The GREENGUARD certification criteria are very strict, and are some of the most rigorous in the world, for building programs standards and specifications. As such, by obtaining this certification, the Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner has proved to be a safe product for use around your loved ones and the surrounding biodiversity.
Application with the Bona PowerPlus Hardwood Floor Deep Cleaner
When dealing with those tough dirt situations, you can go further and switch to the Bona PowerPlus® Hardwood Floor Deep Cleaner, using it together with the PowerPlus® Microfibre Deep Clean Pad that’s on the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop. We’ll get more into this pad in the next section.
Like the other floor cleaner, there’s no mixing required here. It comes ready to use. Simply add it to the mop’s cartridge, spray the target area and clean away. This oxygenated formula relies on the power of hydrogen peroxide to deliver a deep clean to the surface being worked on. That way, those pesky dirt problems that are taking away the beauty of your floor installation are summarily dealt with, without putting the wood floor at risk. It can be used on both finished and unfinished wood floors.
What’s more, it dries fast without leaving behind any residue, meaning that the floor will be ready to use in moments. This is especially a priority for high traffic establishments where you want to reduce disruption to the people walking around on the premises, but also comes in handy in households with kids and pets, where you want the floor to dry quickly to enable the little ones to go about their activities without slip accidents or trudging messes all over the surface. Given that it has obtained the Safer Choice certification, you can proceed to use it around your family and pets without worry.
Additional Uses For The Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop
- Dusting
That pervasive dust that keeps accumulating on the surface of the floor can be easily controlled with a quality dusting pad, since it is not feasible to keep whipping out the cleaning in solution every other hour. Here, the brand that brings you this Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop also provides a Microfibre Dusting Pad, renowned for its effectiveness in dust removal. It is suitable for hardwood installations and hard surface floors, allowing you to dust the surfaces without posing a risk of scratching the installation. With the cleaning action of microfibre, where particles are lifted from the surface and trapped within the material, the Bona® Microfibre Dusting Pad takes things a notch higher by combining short and long fibres for the task. This enables it to pick up different kinds of debris, from that pet fur and dander, the allergens that are riddling the floor and posing a risk to your family and friends, to the microparticles that are too small for the eyes to see.
The electrostatic effect firmly locks in the particles within the pad, trapping them until when the unit will be laundered. Speaking of which, the Bona® Microfibre Dusting Pad is machine washable, and can last for a whopping 500 washes – making it a highly durable tool to add to your cleaning kit. Since the Microfibre Dusting Pad works with all mops from the same brand, you can use it with the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop.
- Deep Cleaning
Here, the focus is on those sections of the floor that have stubborn grime. For this, fix the Bona PowerPlus® Microfibre Deep Clean Pad to the mop.
The PowerPlus® technology that this pad has been constructed with will loosens up that tough dirt build-up, breaking it apart. The scrubbing action makes taking care of those stuck-on messes a breeze. The microfibre then locks in the grime in the material. This dual-zone cleaning, with the outer ark blue fibres breaking down the dirt and the inner light blue fibres absorbing it, increases the efficacy of the cleaning.
In addition, the antimicrobial treatment used on the Bona PowerPlus® Microfibre Deep Clean Pad is beneficial in preventing the growth of odour-causing bacteria on the unit. Note that this particular pad can last for 50 washes. When used with the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop, you can proceed to clean hardwood as well as other hard-surface floors, from stone and tile to laminate and luxury vinyl installations.
The Brand Trusted For Floor Care
Bona has a rich history, going back to when its founder Wilhelm Edner established the business back in 1919. He ran a shop where she sold bonvax that was used to polish wood floors and create a protective surface. He saw its potential and incorporated the company Bona AB, headquartered in Malmö, Sweden. Over a century later, Bona has become a household name all around the world, famed for its quality floor care products.
The brand has a lot going for it that showcases the trust that consumers, both individuals carrying out very day cleaning tasks and professional companies provided different floor care services, place in their products. For instance it has a foothold in on the different continents – from Poland, China and Singapore where offices were opened in 1984, the Asia Pacific region where BonaKeni was launched back in 2000, all through to the US were, by 2016, Bona products were available in 9 out of the leading 10 retailers. In fact, for that year, there were 4 million spray mops sold by the brand.
In addition to the spray mops, the brand has a wide range of products in its portfolio. These include cleaning chemicals for wood, ceramic, tiled, stone, vinyl, linoleum and laminate surfaces, tools and polishing agents that are especially beneficial in protecting the floor. Homeowners and professionals have been relying on the brand for years, and you can benefit from the effectiveness of its tools when you add the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop to your floor cleaning arsenal.
Quick Mop Buying Guide
How do you know the mop that will work for you? Buying a mop can seem pretty straightforward- until you go through the online stores and get overwhelmed by the numerous options that are available. What sets them apart? What should you consider when choosing a particular model for your needs? From homeowners looking to stock up cleaning supplies, companies and institutions who want to equip their janitorial teams, to businesses providing cleaning services for both residential and commercial establishments, there are various factors that will need to be considered before you make that purchase choice. Let’s delve into them:
- Ergonomic design
At the bare minimum, you want a mop that is easy to use. This should also take into account your physical limitations, especially if you have a hard time bending over. For instance, you may want to skip the bending and squeezing out the water as is the case with the traditional cotton yarn mop – in which case the spray-mop functionality of the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop being reviewed here comes in handy. What’s the weight of the mop, and how is its handle length? What kind of grip does it provide? These will weigh into the ease, or lack thereof, of the particular mop being looked into.
- Effectiveness in floor sanitisation
Mopping is not just about getting rid of the visible soiling. There are plenty of microparticles that need to be removed – which range from contaminants, allergens and pollutants, to germs crawling all over the area. Here, the main focus will be the material of the pad that is attached to the mop. For instance, when comparing cotton yarn mophead to microfibre pads used with spray mops, the latter are more effective in picking up those microparticles, giving them the edge when floor sanitation is a priority. This is especially key for areas where health concerns bring about strict cleanliness standards, such as food service establishments and healthcare facilities.
- Versatility
How many different types of floors can the mop be used on? Is the mop designed for work on marble hardwood or stone and other kinds of hard surfaces – or does it cut across the board? Some spray mops have been particularly designed for specific type of floor material, and you’ll need to be sure that the unit you’re going for works for your particular needs. However, those with detachable attachments – such as where you can replace the pads that are fixed onto the spray mops, allow you the flexibility of having one mop that can be used with different pads, giving it usage across multiple types of floors.
- Cartridge capacity
How much cleaning solution can the pray mop hold? Sure, they are designed to reduce the amount of liquids required in the process. However, this does not mean that they have endless supply. The capacity of the cartridge will determine how much area you can cover before having to pause the task and refill the unit.
- Coverage
Here the focus is on the capacity of the mop head, and ties in with the size of the area that needs to be covered. How many rooms will you be mopping? Is it for home use, or are you a contractor whose day is packed with appointments across the city for homes and office spaces that need to be worked on? If you have multiple rooms or a substantially large area to work on, then you may want to go for the spray mops that have a larger head area. That way you will get through more surface area with each pass. However, the trade-off here will be that it may be an inconvenience when dealing with tight awkward spaces. On the other hand, if the spray mop is to be used for lighter duties, then the size may not have much weight in the consideration.
- Effect On Indoor Air Quality
Given that cleaning solutions will be part of the mopping process, what impact will they have on the indoor air space? This is a major factor to consider, especially given that most of the everyday chemical exposure is primarily due to indoor pollutants – be it at home, in offices, schools and other indoor areas. Most of the airborne chemicals responsible for these are volatile organic compounds (VOCs). They are released by different items from building materials, furnishing items. personal care products, to cleaning chemicals. Actually, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), indoor pollutants are usually 2 to 5 times higher in concentration compared to the outdoor environment. Those that are a greater risk of being affected are the young children, elderly members of the household, and persons with respiratory problems who will be spending more time indoors.
What does this have to do with mopping? The choice of cleaning solution made, where you want to be sure that it will be safe to use in your home. You don’t want to be in a situation where your loved ones are being exposed to harmful agents. So when one is working with spray mops like the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop under review, you should ensure that the liquids being added to its cartridge is actually safe for the task.
- Online reviews
This is rather straightforward. Reviews from buyers of the product will give you an impression about the mop that you’re interested in. Seeing it from their experience is key, as one shouldn’t just rely on the information that you get from advertisements. Definitely, there are mops that have looked great on paper, but failed to deliver on what they promise, and there are those that look bland yet they perform effectively. So go through those reviews, checking both the positive and negative ones, to get more information about the product before you click that buy button.
- Brand
Who has manufactured the mop, and what is their track record? Here, the strength of the brand name, coupled with its years of operation and market reach, will be a pointer to the quality of products that they produce. For a company to thrive and be successful in the competitive cleaning industry, it has to have quality control systems in place, to ensure that the products they release to the market deliver on their mandate. You want to deal with a company which has proved itself to be reliable, not one that will have you staying on the phone for hours speaking trying to reach its customer support complaining about the ineffectiveness of its models.
Extra Floor Care Tips
- With wood floors in particular, be careful with the amount of water used on them. It should be as sparingly as possible, given the hygroscopic nature of the wood tissue that causes it to soak up the excess moisture from its environment when there is a steep moisture gradient. Liquids spills should also be attended to as soon as possible, as leaving them on the surface will increase the chances of water damage and permanent stain formation.
- Avoiding vinegar, wax and the “All-purpose” cleaning agents when working on the wood floors. This is because they tend to cause the finish to dull.
- Placing rugs or mats at the entryways will reduce the amount of soiling that is tracked into the premises.
- Get some protective pads of felts for the furniture.
- When the floor shows signs of wear, it will need to be refreshed. For this, start by vacuuming the floor, then cleaning it using specialised solutions like the Wood Floor Cleaner that is used with the Bona Wood Floor Spray Mop.
- Apply the desired floor polish or treatment product based on your particular aesthetic needs.
- Lastly, avoid allowing dirt and grit to build up on the floor. Their abrasive nature makes them leading causes of the deterioration of the surface. Run the vacuum over the floor or sweep it occasionally to keep the dirt levels low.