Scooba Second Impressions

Scooba 5900

My first impressions of Scooba were based on not yet having the official Clorox cleaning solution and running with vinegar water. I got my shipment of the Clorox solution yesterday and ran four cleaning cycles on the bathroom floor. New notes:

  • I had left both batteries fully charged but off the charger for a week, and Scooba reported one as completely dead and the other didn’t make it through a full cleaning cycle. Looks like I’ll need to keep them on the charger and/or use them more frequently.
  • The Clorox solution smells good! (Remember that vinegar is my grounds for comparison . . .) It smells like a cross between some kind of detergent and your widow grandmother’s soap-scented bathroom.
  • The Clorox solution seems to clean a little better than the vinegar water — that is, leaves the floor noticeably cleaner. Scooba made visible progress on the dark marks in the faux grout lines on our vinyl floor.
  • The Clorox solution puts a shine on the floor! I don’t consider it perfect or done, but the bathroom floor looks way nicer than it did before getting Scooba or after running with vinegar.

Note to other secondhand Scooba owners: Buy the Clorox!

4 Responses to “Scooba Second Impressions”

  1. Dave says:

    Chlorine bleach is a great cleaner. Not only is Chlorine bleach terribly fatal to almost all microorganisms, it also bleaches stains away.

    I’m not sure I’d be real comfortable using a vinegar solution for cleaning. Vinegar is somewhat acidic, and I seem to remember that quite a few bacteria like to grow in a slightly acidic environment.

    Hmm, one week is way too fast of a self-discharge period for any type of battery. It sounds like you either have a battery problem or a charger problem.

    Dave

  2. Keith Neufeld says:

    Dave, the interesting thing about the Clorox cleaning solution for Scooba is that I don’t think it has any bleach in it (although we usually associate bleach with Clorox) — I have a fairly sensitive nose and I definitely don’t smell bleach. It’s just a cleaning product made by Clorox.

    Agreed about the battery or charger problem. The Scooba manual recommends keeping the battery on the charger (either the external battery charger or with the power supply plugged into the Scooba) when not in use — but I’m not convinced it’s a smart enough charger to cut out when the battery is fully charged, so that seems to me like a recipe for a short usable life.

    For now, I’m trying to fully charge the batteries immediately after use, store them disconnected between uses, and top them off on the charger before use. We’ll see how that goes.

  3. Raptor says:

    The Clorox Solution for the Scooba does NOT NOT NOT contain Bleach for SURE! Bleach will ruin the internal sensors in the tanks. I have been using low foaming floor cleaning products that do not contain bleach in mine for four years without problems. The battery and the Manufacture’s instructions to leave it plugged in the charger all the time is the only problem.. Do they tell u to do that in order to sell more batteries? The onboard charger will destroy a battery in a week or so if it left on…

  4. Mark says:

    Has anyone tried the Scooba on Kronotex laminate flooring? I’m sure they say not to use it, but I would think the seal on laminate is as tight or tighter than on wood flooring. Thanks.

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