I have never used clorox to clean the floors. What can I expect?

[Baitball Blogger]

I imagine that I should change into clothes into anything that I don't mind getting bleach spots? What else might be in jeopardy? And, half and half solution? Half water/half clorox?

[hlthe2b]

1. Heavens no. Disinfection dilution for floors and surfaces is 1/2 cup to a GALLON of water.

For food, (rinsing greens for ex) no more than 200 ppm (thats 2 TEASPOONS to a gallon of water).

If you spill undiluted bleach on you, your clothing will suffer.

[Baitball Blogger]

3. Perfect. I'm glad I asked.

Thank you.

[OhNo-Really]

8. 1:10 bleach:water

Used this for years. Wear gloves.

[Tanuki]

2. Read these instructions on floor cleaning from Clorox:

https://www.clorox.com/how-to/hard-surface-cleaning/tile/how-to-clean-tile-floors/

Move

Move all furniture and household accessories such as trash cans out of the way.

Sweep

For a deeper clean, sweep the floor before mopping to remove the excess dirt.

Plan

Start at the farthest corner and work backward toward the door.



Mix

Pour ½ cup of Clorox® Regular-Bleach2 with CLOROMAX® into 1 gallon of water.

Mop

Mop the floor with bleach solution. Overlap each stroke as you mop the floor for double-duty cleaning.

Wait

Wait 5 minutes for disinfecting.

Rinse

Rinse with warm water.

Dry

Remove all cleaning items and let the floor air dry.

[Baitball Blogger]

5. Thank you!

[OhNo-Really]

9. Damp wipe to remove soil before bleach wetting

[PJMcK]

4. Try this information

It's from the Clorox website and they call for a 1 part Clorox to 30 parts water.

https://www.clorox.com/how-to/laundry-basics/bleach-101/dilution-ratio/

50%-50% would probably be far too harsh. Chlorine bleach is a very caustic chemical and you should wear dish gloves when using. Don't get any on your skin or you'll get a nasty chemical burn. Rinse everything with lots of water when you're finished.

Stay clean and stay healthy!

[Baitball Blogger]

6. thank you!

I'm learning something from every post.

[magicarpet]

7. Way too much bleach in your formula.

Wash the floor with warm water and detergent, let air dry. This gets rid of any heavy dirt and soil.

Then with the warmest water you can safely handle in a bucket add,

Per gallon of warm water add 1 cup (6oz) of household bleach. Wash and sanitize surfaces, let air dry.

The CDC web site link is helpful, you should read and save for future reference.

https://www.cdc.gov/disasters/bleach.html

[ProfessorGAC]

22. Despite The Link...

...I'll recommend against the hot water.
First, labile chlorine is so reactive, that elevating the temperature by 30 kelvins isn't going to provide a real world increase in kinetics to be meaningful
Second, it makes the chance of getting scalded higher, & the last thing we need is people going to the ER when the injury was wholly avoidable.
The only advantage to hot water is the floor dries faster due to the higher vapor pressure of the water.
Unless it's critical to have dry floors fast, please use room temperature water.

[magicarpet]

23. True oh so true what you said sir.

I was thinking of my application of washing and sanitizing with bleach. Of course I have a hospital style stainless steel bucket with dolly wheel with a big floor mop wringer for the industrial floor mop.

I have three rooms with quarry floor tiles.
As far as house work is concerned, we divided it up. The cleaning maintenance of the floors is my job or daily chore. I hate it when the gray grout cement lines of the tiles are not evenly gray once the floor dries. If kitchen grease, animal fats, normal soil and dirt gets too deep in the grout lines, the grout lines of the high traffic areas develop a darker gray shade. This irks me. So I crank the temp of the water up to keep the oils and grease at bay.

Also too, I cheat a bit and mix the detergents with the bleach,.. and confess I do use very hot water. It activates the surfactants in the detergents, and the higher the temp of the H2O. This enables me to crank back the amount of detergent s and bleach chemicals required as I go about my daily chore of floor cleaning maintenance.

For safety's sake, you are correct about the temp of the water, we desire that no one's belly or thigh gets burnt by the water being too hot while sanitizing or cleaning the home.

Good day to you sir.
The post has been edited to reflect your concerns.

[ProfessorGAC]

26. Surfactants Do Not Work Better With Hot Water

That's an artifact of the days when "detergents" were soap. (Soap & detergent are chemically different.)
Now, it is true for some laundry applications, particularly where protenaceous soils (grass stains, for instance) are dispersed more uniformly so micellization is more efficacious.
On hard surfaces, the critical micelle level is already achieved with cold water.
Trust me on this. My professional specialty was in organic surface chemistry & phase structures.
Almost all commercials available cleaning products are formulated to work in cold water.
If you're adding bleach, you don't need the temperature to disinfect. Besides, a thin film of surfactant containing water cools so fast, you're just wasting natural gas, heating it up in the first place.
Keep this as safe as possible. There's no penalty to be paid regarding efficacy.
Stay safe & healthy.

[magicarpet]

28. Oh, okay,..

You say po-ta-to,
I say po-tah-toh,

Incidentally, how is it you pronounce
To-mah-toh ?

Can we just agree there are differing strokes for differing folks. No one is right or wrong we often have differing and competing viewpoints, and that's okay.

******
(begin snip from article at Smithsonian site)

Many opt to wash in warm or hot water because of the roles it can play in cleaning your clothes, writes Dvorsky. Heat typically makes chemical reactions go faster. This is where the type of detergent you use becomes important. Many powder detergents — and until recently most detergents in general — are made for warm water use. Chemicals called surfactants drive the cleaning process in heavy-duty detergents.

Like most soaps, surfactants are forever divided: One side of the molecule likes water, the other doesn't, as Richard Baguley and Colin McDonald explained earlier this year for CNET. When surfactants form circular chains, they ensnare dirt particles. With the help of other chemicals that break stains down, the anti-water (or hydrophobic) end latches on to the dirt, while the water-friendly (or hydrophilic) end keeps everything afloat in the wash. Thus, particles of dirt, sweat and stains wash down the drain trapped in these tiny bubbles of soap. But, these chemicals don't work as quickly or efficiently in cold water.

(end snip)

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/case-washing-clothes-cold-water-180955459/

[ProfessorGAC]

29. I Addressed This

First, there is no chemical reaction in cleaning applications. It's phase orientation which is a physical event, not exponentially linked to temperature. The chemical reactions occur in the manufacture of the active ingredients, not in your washing machine or your floor.
This article doesn't say that hot water works better.
I don't personally know Baguley or McDonald, but I do know Dvorsky & Johnson.
In this article Johnson is right & Dvorsky is wrong. And if I weren't retired and still went to saw conferences and saw him, I'd tell him so.
There is simply no science supporting that micellization is either meaningfully faster or more phase stable.
Sorry to be so pedantic on this. But, nobody mentioned in this article knows more about this phase chemistry than I do. Equal? Perhaps. More? No.

[Best_man23]

10. Also watch bleach use in poorly ventilated areas of the house

Fumes can become overpowering in such places. We have a tiled shower and the company that built this house did a crap job grouting the tile, so it captures lots of mold. So when we clean it, we have to hit it with a high bleach/water concentration.

[lastlib]

13. THIS!!

As it evaporates, it gives off chlorine gas--will burn your airways and lungs if inhaled in sufficient quantity. Very important to ventilate and NOT breathe it in!!

[Tanuki]

11. Also, if you are not accustomed to using chlorine bleach, you may not know

that it is extremely dangerous (even deadly) to use in combination with ammonia.

https://www.doh.wa.gov/YouandYourFamily/HealthyHome/Contaminants/BleachMixingDangers

"Dangers of Mixing Bleach with Cleaners

Don't mix bleach with ammonia, acids, or other cleaners. Mixing bleach with common cleaning products can cause serious injuries. Be sure to always read the product label before using a cleaning product.

Chlorine Bleach

Sodium Hypochlorite is the active ingredient in chlorine bleach. It is found in household bleach and many other disinfectants. Sodium hypochlorite reacts with ammonia, drain cleaners, and other acids. Many household products state that they contain bleach on the label.

Mixing Bleach and Ammonia

When bleach is mixed with ammonia, toxic gases called chloramines are produced. Exposure to chloramine gases can cause the following symptoms:  

Coughing.Nausea.Shortness of breath.Watery eyes.Chest pain.Irritation to the throat, nose, and eyes.Wheezing.Pneumonia and fluid in the lungs.Ammonia Products

In addition to using ammonia as a cleaning product, ammonia can be found in some glass and window cleaners, interior and exterior paints, and in urine (use caution when cleaning litter boxes, diaper pails, or toilet bowls).

Mixing Bleach and Acids

When chlorine bleach is mixed with an acid, chlorine gas is given off. Chlorine gas and water combine to make hydrochloric and hypochlorous acids.

Chlorine gas exposure, even at low levels and short periods of time, almost always irritates the mucous membranes (eyes, throat, and nose), and causes coughing and breathing problems, burning and watery eyes, and a runny nose. Higher levels of exposure can cause chest pain, more severe breathing difficulties, vomiting, pneumonia, and fluid in the lungs. Very high levels can cause death.

Chlorine can be absorbed through the skin, resulting in pain, inflammation, swelling, and blistering. Hydrochloric acid also causes burns to the skin, eyes, nose, throat, mouth, and lungs.

Acid Products

Products containing acids include vinegar and some glass and window cleaners, automatic dishwasher detergents and rinses, toilet bowl cleaners, drain cleaners, rust removal products, and brick and concrete cleaners.  

Mixing Bleach with Other Cleaning Products

Bleach also reacts with some oven cleaners, hydrogen peroxide, and some insecticides. Pool chemicals frequently contain calcium hypochlorite or sodium hypochlorite and should not be mixed with other cleaning products."

[Baitball Blogger]

12. To all: Results of my Clorox floor cleaning.

I survived. Life will never be the same.

Floor mopping has been easier since I purchased a spin mop bucket. I think it was $29.00 and included mop, dust pan and broom. I once used Pine Sol, mostly, and sometimes Fabuloso, but I guess there's nothing like clorox to disinfect the floor.

The new step in the process when using Clorox is the rinse with water. Just an extra step. Annoying, but necessary. Took longer than I liked, but as I said before, life will never be the same again.

[Kali]

17. get cheap no name bleach from the dollar store (or pool section of hardware/wallyworld)

it doesn't have whatever the hell that crap is in clorox and you won't have to rinse.

[Baitball Blogger]

18. Now you've got my curiousity.

What's in Clorox that isn't in the cheap brand?

[Kali]

20. "cloromax"

all chlorine bleach (and liquid pool chlorine) is sodium hypochlorite and water

Clorox came up with the thicker, no splash formula that foams up to differentiate its bleach from the others.

(there may still be some plain sodium hypochlorite Clorox out there but I haven't seen it in a long time)

[Baitball Blogger]

21. thank you!

[magicarpet]

24. It is all the same, 5% sodium hypochlorite and water.

Clorox is a big company and advertises in all the glossy magazines and soap opera TV ad slots. Clorox has to pay for all this high priced advertisements. So that cost to them is reflected in a much higher retail price passed on to you the consumer of their product.

BY STORE GENERIC,
NO BRAND NAME BLEACH.

[yellowdogintexas]

30. spin top mops are the best! nt

[Grammy23]

14. I know some people do not like the smell of bleach. But I know its excellent cleaning

Properties and it is death on certain unhealthy things like bacteria. I read (somewhere on the internet so we know it is true, right?) that morticians use bleach in prepping bodies of AIDS patients. So when I walk in a public bathroom and it smells of bleach, I am actually relieved because I know they used a cleaner that is effective at killing pathogens that might hurt ME. And the smell fumes off pretty fast and leaves just a clean smell.

[Laffy Kat]

15. One tablespoon bleach for every one gallon of water.

Use room-temperature water only. Very hot or very cold diminishes the disinfectant effect. And whatever you do, do not follow with ammonia. Households with bleach should not have ammonia and vice-versa.

[LisaL]

16. Overwhelming smell of bleach.

[la-trucker]

19. 4 table spoons to a gallon of water - won't cause any stains

[wishstar]

25. Strong bleach can remove the shiny protective finish from vinyl flooring so be very careful

Bleach must very diluted or just use something like Lemon Fresh Mr Clean which also should be diluted before use

[captain queeg]

27. I recently mixed some bleach in with Pinesol.

I got bitched at because it supposedly left a film or affected the shine. I didn’t notice that myself. I didn’t do a separate rinse so maybe that was it.