Hoover FloorMate, anybody?

[hooverwheelaway]

So, I was at my local Target tonight.. (not an un-common place for me to be), and I just happened to wander into the vacuum cleaner aisle. Go figure.

Anyways, being after Christmas, just about everything in the store is on some sort of clearance.

If anyone has ever wanted a Hoover FloorMate, now would be the time to drive to Target and get one. The one they had on clearance was the purple model H3030 which we sell at Hoover for $159. They had it marked down with those little red stickers--for $85. That's less than wholesale. It's still a current model, it just looks as though Target doesn't want to carry this one any more.

I would think (and I hope after posting this) that these prices and clearance items are the same nationally, not just at my local Target. Below is a picture of the model in question.

I just wanted to pass this along to all of my appliance friends.. Happy New Year, everyone!

Fred

 

[vinvac]

Thanks Fred

I am going right out to Target and check this out. I have wanted one for a long time. May be my Christmas present from me to me...

Morgan

 

[retromom]

Can the Floormate save my life?

Hey Fred!

What's your opinion of the cleaning ability of the Floormate (or similar) on tile and laminate floors? I have the darndest time using anything but a mop on this stuff. I'm working harder to keep the floors clean than I ever worked in my life! FEH!

Venus

 

[Maytagluver]

Hey Venus.. you'll luv it

Greetings Venus, wanted to put my 2 cents in about the Floor Mate.
I have 2 ShihTzu dogs. Living in Indiana, we have nasty winter weather, the "boys" come in w/ dirty feet, can't always get em' to stop for a foot wipe.
Anyway, I have Pergo in the kitchen/dining area, the
Floor Mate w/ a SMALL amount of Murphy's Oil Soap does the trick :>
In between using the Hoover, I use a Swiffer Wet, also does pretty good job.
Hope this help ya to decide.
Happy New Year to all!!!!

Al 8^)

 

[super32]

Floormate here

I have had one for about 3yrs? Its just ok. I was raised with out a mop. My mother and grand mother said if you want a floor clean you have to get on 4's and clean it. It doesnt do very well in corners and certain thing that get stuck on the floor. Part of this is because out kitchen floor is a rough finish. Its nice to have when i'm pressed to get things done because of other pressing engagments but when time permits i'm down on all 4's still doing what my granny said I need to do. The other kirk to it is i'm on my second squegee head and may soon need a third. It also likes to leak until the "clean" solution is about 1/3 used. The model in the picture is different from the one I have (H3000) they may have improved the new one.

Scott

 

[hooverwheelaway]

Hey y'all..

Well, I own one and really love it (I own the original model). It gets me to clean the floors... I've heard good and bad reviews of the FloorMate--more good than bad.

Just like there's never going to be a perfect vacuum cleaner, partly due to the fact that everyone has different types of carpeting and living situations, same goes with the FloorMate. Sure, it doesn't get firm up next to baseboards--but why would that area of the floor need hardcore cleaning? It's not really a high traffic area. Just as I tell my customers: You're still going to have to go around with a rag on the end of a yardstick every few times you use it--just as you go around a carpeted room with the crevice tool every once in a while.

The newer model is much improved over the original. Stronger motor, easier to empty, handle release where you'd expect it, handy "dial" for choosing wet/dry pickup or wet scrub..

I also don't use mine as a vacuum cleaner, even though you can. I use another one of my machines, and I don't have to go through having to empty the dry dirt before I add the water/detergent.

Just be sure to maintain it-- rinse and let dry the dirty water tank, clean the brushes out... And MOST IMPORTANTLY, don't use Pine-Sol, Vinegar, Bleach or Ammonia. They don't play well with the rubber gaskets and are the #1 reason the tanks leak (vinegar, especially), or they don't dispense water. You'd be surprised how well just plain hot water works..

Happy Cleaning!

Fred

 

[sudsmaster]

That is a good price. I got the original Floormate - from Costco, as I recall - for $180 when they first came out. I like it, and I think it's a valuable kitchen floor cleaning aid. I keep a spray bottle of the diluted cleaner for pretreating stuck-on spots, and a long handles floor scrub brush for loosening them up (ok, I sometimes let the floor get pretty gross!).

What I like most about the Floormate is that it can get the floor very clean. After using the detergent, typically I run a container of hot water through to rinse and dry the floor. No wet mop can do this as well as the Floormate.

My main complaints:

Detergent and receiving tanks are too small

Handle has sharpedged chevron patterns that dig into my hand.

The controls are placed very stupidly. Where one normally expects to find the handle release, is the on/off control. And the switch for choosing between wet/dry/scrub/suck is cryptic and poorly placed.

If I were to make a suggestion, that would be to provide "turbo" option. This would lower the brushes a bit to put more scrubbing pressure on extra dirty spots. As it is, the brushes are too gentle to get the really dirt out... hence my use of pretreatment and a long handled floor scrub brush. But it's still way better than trying to wring all the dirt and suds out of a string or sponge mop.

I may be paying my local Target a visit to take a look at the new, improved, cheaper model

 

[DADoES]

I have an H3000. Haven't used it much. I read a few bad reviews on epinions, so was a little leery of buying one, but it works better than I expected. That being said, dry vacuum is somewhat weak and I use my Celebrity more often than my FloorMate.

I've only done wet cleaning once, and it wasn't as messy as I feared. Tank capacity is on the small side, takes four water changes to do my entire house. As was mentioned above, some sort of "turbo" mode for better brush action would be helpful. Wet cleaning really is only for light surface soil, and doesn't do anything for sticky spots. Wet pickup is OK, but requires at least a couple passes over each area.

I hate mopping. I didn't even have a mop at my previous house. With just four small areas of vinyl (kitchen, dining room, and two baths), I preferred to wipe the floor with a wet cloth. My house now has large areas of travertine tile, so the wet-rag method takes much more effort, which is why I bought the FloorMate. I make a conscious effort not to let my floor get dirty to the point that more than dry vacuum is needed. The one time I did wet cleaning, I did it barefoot, and my floor did feel clean after. I like the idea of vacuuming up the scrub water instead of trying to soak it up with a mop or rag

 

[hooverwheelaway]

My demonstration...

When I'm giving a FloorMate demonstration, this is what I usually say about the most commonly asked questions...

Tank Capacity:

"The first floor of my house has hardwood floors in the foyer, dining room, kitchen, dinette, garage entrance and powder room. I've FloorMated my floors and had to refil 3 times, and I've floormated and had to refil 6 or 7 times. It all depends on how "trigger-happy" the user is, how diligently one wants to clean, how dirty the floors are (how much time passes between cleanings), and how large the space is/if one is moving the kitchen table and chairs and other things that may take up floorspace."

Scrubbing ability:

"If there's dried Kool-Aid, or mud, you're going to have to pass over the area a few times; it's not going to get it all in one pass."

"I usually break my floors down into 4x5 foot areas and "wet scrub" back and forth for a pass or two... then I shut the brushes off by flipping it to "wet pickup" and go over the area a second time to pick up any residual water, then move on to the next area and repeat."

And as always: all floors, homes, and users are different... so everyone develops their own way of using it.

-Fred

 

[sudsmaster]

Just got back from my local Target. The 3030 is not on sale - the self price and the scanner both said $169.

Travertine scares me... all those nooks and crannies... but it does look nice...

 

[hooverwheelaway]

Sorry..!

I apologize for the bum-steer.. Must be my local Target only.

 

[scott55405]

I've always thought this was an interesting little unit that certainly has its place in the market; however I wish they had not discontinued the Floor-a-Matic in favor of it.

For the uninitiated, a Floor-a-Matic is the same in principle in that it will dispense and pick up your liquid cleaners, but the Floor-a-Matic is a traditional two revolving brush scrubber/polisher/shampooer. Happily I own one (and they can be found on Ebay) and find that it excels in all of its tasks.

 

[hooverwheelaway]

Floor-A-Matic vs. Floor Mate

Scott, you raise a valid point. Thanks for bringing up the Floor A Matic! But, IMHO, I tend to agree and disagree...

In 1967 when the Floor A Matic made its debut, it was very cutting edge--something completely new; a machine that power scurbbed, stripped wax, applied wax, buffed, damp mopped, shampooed, and sucked its scrub water back up. They are fantastic machines, and people still rave about them. The best part about them is that you can let the brushes scrub without the water getting sucked up. When you choose to suck the water up, you shut the machine off, flip the switch to "wet pickup" and suck up your dirty scrub water. A drawback to the Floor-A-Matic is when you do "wet pickup" the motor reverses, and the water is sucked up--but passes through a fan--much like a "dirty air" upright vacuum cleaner. One also wouldn't want to use them to scrub/mop wood floors, as the water stays down too long and would damage wood floors.

The Floormate allows you to vacuum before hand (not a huge deal in my opinion), and most importantly, because the machine is constantly sucking, the water is never on the floor too long, thus making it able to use on hardwood floors. There's also a lot more suction behind it, and it's a "clean-air" system, so if a pebble were missed by the vacuum or broom, it wouldn't break the machine's fan.

I partly wish the Floor A Matic (or the "Scrub 'n Vac Shampoo Polisher" or the "FloorMax" as they were also known) was still made. But, another side of me says: It had a good 33 year run... time to move on.

The Floor A Matic was for a different generation of people... Those who have had Floor-A-Matics dislike the FloorMate, and I'm sure the majority of those who have only had a FloorMate (this group aside) would probably dislike the Floor-A-Matic (they'd look at it as being too much work). Not to mention, the Floor-A-Matics were expensive! (They were made in the USA, by actual people.. not in China, by low-wage workers--I digress.. that's a different thread altogether).

Anyway, the Floor-A-Matic will always stand out to me as one of those Hoover Engineering Marvels, like the Beater Bar and WindTunnel Technology...

Heres a picture of my vintage machines... the yellow one even came with a headlight!

-Fred

 

[sudsmaster]

When I visited Target, the only model they had on display was the 3060, which comes with that handy spot cleanup hose/brush. I thought that could be useful, turning it into sort of a replacement for the Bissell little green machine. But the brush roll for the 3060 looked bigger than that on my 3000. Is it bigger? And is the brush roll on the 3030 and 3060 the same size?

The 3060 box was quite a bit larger than that for the 3030, which made me wonder...

 

[petek]

Now what about the similar Bissell and other makes I've seen competing with the Floor Mate, anyone tried those?
I have a Hoover Steam Vac that came with a squeegee attachment and says you can use it for cleaning hard floors as well. I only tried it one, the machine is too big and cumbersome for tight spots.

 

[hooverwheelaway]

3030 vs. 3060

Hey Sudsmaster-

Yup, the H3030 has 6 brushes. The H3060 (or the H3060-020-in blue, not aqua) has 7 Brushes, and comes with a 'detail kit' --a set of attachments for getting behind the toilet, and a special grout cleaning tool. Both machines come with a second set of brushes for doing tile floors with deep grout lines (the center part of the brush is removed so they can dig into the grout).

And yes, they are a lot easier to use than the original H3000!!

Fred

 

[hooverwheelaway]

Picture

Here's the H3060

 

[scott55405]

Hi Fred! Gasp! You have the coveted headlight model! ;-) That, and the old turquoise polisher with the tank and variable speed from the 60s, are my two favorite polishers! Was the headlight model the very first Floor a Matic?

I do see what you mean; and I have heard previously people mention what you were saying about wood floors, and that makes perfect sense. In my case, in Minnesota we had ceramic floors in the kitchen, baths and foyer, and tile in the basement laundry, and the Floor a matic was great for them all. Now, I have the no wax tile floor, which I was able to clean up and buff up beautifully, and living in an apt it's handy to have that feature and have it double as a shampooer.

Mine was sold for $184.95 at a hardware store out east in 1984. That was quite a sum for 1984, but they are of course very solid and well made. I think they bought it maybe to shampoo the rugs or something, did it once and never did it again. I could tell it was not used much and I don't think any of the pads were ever used. I bought it on Ebay. It's the burnt orange one, but I don't mind since I bought it to use. If I had the headlight one, I'd never want to get it dirty! LOL

 

[hooverwheelaway]

FAM Models...

Scott-

The model 3600 was the first Floor-A-Matic, it was orange and brown (just like the 1120 Dial A Matic). Then I came a 3610 which had a yellow panel above the tank but no headlight. That was followed by the green and yellow ones like I have--they were out at the same time (early-mid 70's), the yellow one with the headlight was TOL. Next, I think it was light blue and white for a while (same colors as the last Power Drive Dial A Matic)... Then in the early-mid 80's, was the burnt orange color like you have... They changed to burgundy and white in the late 80's and into the 90's.. Then the last generation was black with a chrome handle and red accents.

The headlight Floor-A-Matic is a lot of fun.. I don't really use it, because it's not very common, it sits with the vacuums. The green one I have, I think has a similar story to yours.. It couldn't have been used more than once or twice, it's a gem!