If you are using a mop that has not been cleaned properly, it can spread dirt and grime instead of picking it up, leaving streaks on your floors. To prevent this, it's important to regularly clean and sanitize your mop and change the water when it gets dirty.
Mopping with dirty water usually causes that buildup and dirty appearance, even though it was just mopped. Dirt is added to a mop bucket each time the mop is dunked into the water, if you don't change the water you are just transferring the dirt and grime around the floors through the dirty water.
Vacuum, dust or wipe with a lightly dampened mop – never use soap-based detergents, as they can leave a dull film on the floor, and avoid over-wetting. Don't use wax polish either, as this will make the floor slippery. To remove marks and stains, use a dilute solution of water and vinegar.
Floors can look or feel dirty for a number of reasons. Dirty hard surface floors are usually caused by the environment, an overuse of chemicals, and a large volume of traffic. Fortunately, there are many things you can do to keep your floor looking and feeling cleaner for longer.
You can use white vinegar—its acidity also helps eliminate stickiness! Add 1 cup of vinegar to a gallon of warm water and wipe the floors. Then, rinse the floor with clean water. The best thing about the vinegar method is that it's a more environmentally friendly solution.
Apply a heavy concentrated solution of floor soap and hot tap water. After soaking, scrub up dirt with your motorized scrubbing tool. Remove dirt-filled water with wet vacuum or mop. Mop floor again with fresh hot tap water to rinse residual soil and soap.
But as a rule of thumb, you should mop your floors at least once a week—especially in areas that are more likely to get stains from drips and spills, like the kitchen and bathroom. “Of course, you need to vacuum or sweep the floor before mopping,” explains Leiva.
The best solutions for mopping a floor include using white vinegar, dish soap, window cleaner, or rubbing alcohol methods. These floor cleaners are easy to make at home and keep your floors clean. Before you use these methods, you'll first need to know how to care for your flooring type.
The likely cause for dirty-looking tiles is not using clean enough water while cleaning the floor. The water in your bucket must be changed frequently to clean the floors.
Mopping regularly helps to prevent dust accumulation on the floor. Moping can be done with water and a floor cleaner. If you want to go the organic way (which we recommend), then a combination of baking soda, lemon juice and water will handle the job.
The only vinegar that works for cleaning floors is distilled white vinegar. The simple kind. It has an acidity of 5 percent which is perfect for cutting through grease, grime, and dirt. It is also cheap enough that you can use tonnes of it in cleaning all your surfaces, and still not break the bank or your budget.
There's no need to rinse your vinegar-mopping solution from your floors. Keep in mind that your floors should be drying very quickly if you've wrung out your mop sufficiently.
Floor Cleaner
The cleaning enzymes in laundry detergent work great at pulling away dirt from floors. Fill your mop bucket up with hot water, then add one teaspoon of laundry detergent (a little goes a long way).
High-traffic areas, like kitchens, bathrooms, hallways, and entryways, require weekly mopping. Infrequently used rooms, such as formal living areas or guest rooms, can be mopped every other week, or even once a month, so long as they're vacuumed once every seven days to remove dust and grit.
It consists of five steps: 1) removing dry soil, 2) setting up for wet cleaning, 3) wet cleaning, 4) drying, and 5) take down and sign removal. Removing dry soil can be accomplished by sweeping, dust mopping, or vacuuming, depending on conditions and equipment available.
The first four hours of the day are considered appropriate for sweeping the house, while the last four hours of a day i.e. at night are considered inappropriate for this work.
Clean before you mop.
Mopping isn't a one-stop shop for cleaning the floors. You should always sweep, dust mop or vacuum to remove large pieces of debris and stray hair.
Light dust and soils on a hard floor surface can very effectively be removed with water only. Heavier soils, sticky syrupy soils, petroleum based soils, kitchen areas and restrooms typically require more than water and there are specially designed chemicals for these.
Combine 1/2 cup water, 1/2 cup dishwashing detergent, 1-2/3 cups baking soda, and 2 tablespoons distilled white vinegar. Stir the mixture until everything is dissolved. Pour it into a spray bottle. Wash flooring in small sections by spraying on, mopping off, then rinsing thoroughly with warm water.
Create a mopping solution of ½ cup of vinegar and one gallon of warm water. Proper dilution is important, since vinegar's acidic, abrasive properties can have a stronger effect on some materials than others—tile being one of those. When mopping, less is more; make sure to wring out your mop thoroughly after each dip.
Vinegar is a natural disinfectant that works well as a mopping solution without leaving any chemical residue on your floors. Although some people don't like the scent, this odor is evident only as you mop and clean—it will fade away rapidly as the solution dries. The results left behind are a gorgeous, clean floor.
Vinegar + Water is the safest combo for cleaning. If you're facing a tough spot while you mop, sprinkle a little bit of dry baking soda onto the area and scrub at it by hand. Undiluted vinegar will have some reactions to the baking soda, though not enough to cause an issue. Never add vinegar to your steam mop.