What Is a Floor Grinder?

Hand-held Grinders

• Hand-held grinders such as 8-inch cup-wheel angle grinders are generally used in small-scale construction projects, such as a concrete floor that has some imperfections to be fixed before a basement bathroom can be installed. They are ideal for small projects because they can fit in hard-to-reach areas that commercial grinders cannot and because they are easier to control for a more detailed finish in areas where it counts.

Commercial Grinders

• Typical commercial grinders are used in large-scale projects and are specifically designed to deal with large areas, such as concrete slabs in warehouses, airports or commercial shopping centers. Some are manually controlled by a user who walks behind the machine; larger machines are driven rather than pushed. Their primary purpose is smoothing down large floor areas prior to finishing, but they can also be used to remove existing finishes, such as paint on top of concrete.

Scarifiers

• A smooth surface such as a concrete slab may need to be abraded before another layer of concrete can be added on top of it. Scarifiers are special versions of floor grinders that are designed to rough up the top layer of flooring material. They can etch, groove or simply pockmark the surface. They can also be used to carve out high spots to level a concrete slab.

Polishers

• Polishing machines are grinders that are specifically used for polishing finished surfaces. They are used with surfaces like finish concrete, resin-based floors, poured epoxy, or terrazzo floors, which are always finished after they have been poured and the chemicals hardened. Polishers are more expensive than other floors grinders because they are used only in the finishing stages and cannot be used for rough-in work or prep work.