Clarke® Focus® II MicroRider™ Compact Ride-On Floor Scrubber, 26" Disc or 28" BOOST

Disc or BOOST: Which MicroRider Deck Fits Your Floor?

Both decks ride on Clarke's SafetyGlide mount. When you turn the steering wheel, the deck swings in line with the rear squeegee, so the squeegee follows the path you just scrubbed and picks up the water instead of leaving a wet arc on the turn. There are no side skirts to buy or replace, and the spring-loaded deck gives way if it touches a wall, so you can scrub tight along baseboards. Our guide to disk, cylindrical and orbital scrub heads compares the two styles across brands.

Disc 26: everyday scrubbing

Two 13-inch pad drivers or brushes spin at 230 RPM and press down at 65 lb, or 105 lb with the extra pressure button for a dirty patch. It's the right fit for nightly scrubbing of sealed VCT, LVT, sealed concrete and tile, and it takes the round 13-inch pads and brushes most janitorial closets already stock. Clarke rates it at 42,328 sq ft an hour at full speed. Take off 30% to 50% for turns and refills, and you get a realistic 21,000 to 29,600 square feet an hour.

BOOST 28: deeper scrubbing and stripping with water

The 14 x 28 inch rectangular pad moves in tight orbits at 2,250 RPM instead of spinning, so it works the floor from every direction and stays flat across the whole path. Clarke says it uses up to 70% less solution and gets about 40% more life out of each pad. Fit a stripping pad and run plain water, and it removes floor finish without stripper chemicals, so there are no fumes in the building the next morning. It's rated at 45,484 sq ft an hour, or roughly 22,700 to 31,800 in real use.

The trade-offs are real. A flat pad can't reach low spots, so very uneven floors keep some finish in the dips, and floors with heavy buildup may still need one chemical strip first. BOOST runs its own rectangular pads, not the round ones you may already have, and it costs $1,770 more than the matching disc model. If you never strip floors and a disc already gets them clean, the Disc 26 is the better buy.

Battery: 242 Ah Wet or 255 Ah AGM

Both packs are four 6-volt batteries under the seat, making 24 volts, and the onboard charger is set for either type. The 242 Ah wet pack costs less but needs topping up with distilled water. The 255 Ah AGM pack is sealed and maintenance-free and costs $1,870 more. Clarke lists up to 3.5 hours of runtime, which covers most single-building night routes. Our guide to floor scrubber batteries explains the difference in more depth.

Standard or Chemical Mixing

On a standard machine you mix detergent into the solution tank. With the chemical mixing system (about $1,000 more), the tank holds clean water and a pump draws detergent from a container under the seat. A button on the control panel sets 0.5, 1, 2 or 3 oz per gallon, and the setting holds even when you change the water flow. It ends the guesswork when several people share the machine.

Not sure which setup fits? Send us your square footage, floor type, doorway and elevator sizes, or call (855) 601-5678, and we'll tell you, including when the answer is a walk-behind.

Focus II Walk-Behind or MicroRider?

The MicroRider is the step up from the Clarke Focus II walk-behind. It is actually shorter than the walk-behind and cleans with a similar path, so the real difference is where the operator is: seated and driving at 3.7 mph instead of walking at up to 260 feet a minute (about 3 mph). Here's how the two compare.

Sitting down costs $4,680 on the Disc 26 and $5,520 on the BOOST 28. That pays back when one person scrubs long runs of floor every night, and it doesn't when the route is mostly small rooms and tight turns. Our guide to walk-behind vs ride-on floor scrubbers walks through the math.

Need bigger tanks or a wider path? The full-size Clarke Focus II Rider has 31-gallon tanks, 310 to 420 Ah battery packs, up to 220 lb of disc down pressure and a 34-inch deck option, from $26,633. It's 60 inches long and needs a 63-inch aisle to turn, so it wants more room than the MicroRider.

The Owner's Insights on the Clarke Focus II MicroRider

The MicroRider makes the most sense in buildings that have outgrown a walk-behind but are too cut up for a full-size rider. Schools, clinics and office floors with elevators are the classic case. Before you buy, measure the elevator car and the door. Fully loaded with batteries, water and an operator, the Disc 26 weighs about 983 lb and the BOOST 28 about 1,005 lb.

For doorways, the squeegee is the widest part at 35 inches, but it comes off with two handwheels. Without it the body is 26.4 inches wide on the disc model and 28.7 inches on BOOST, which clears most standard doors.

I'd pick the Disc 26 for most buyers. It runs round pads you can buy anywhere and costs less. Go BOOST if you strip floors in-house and want to stop buying stripper. If nobody on your crew will water batteries every week, spend the extra on AGM.

One honest note on price. If you don't need the MicroRider's compact size, the Tornado BD 28/27 rider with lead acid batteries costs about $4,700 less. If lithium matters more to you than BOOST, look at the 20-inch ICE RS20L ($16,991) or the 28-inch NaceCare CRL 2128 (from $16,995).

Why You'll Love the Clarke Focus II MicroRider

• Turns around in a 59-inch aisle. A compact rider that goes where full-size riders can't, so one operator covers the whole building.

• SafetyGlide deck. The deck follows the squeegee through turns for full water pickup, with no side skirts to replace.

• Safe-T-Steering. The machine slows itself in turns, and it only moves with the operator in the seat.

• 21-gallon tanks, up to 3.5 hours. Enough water and battery for most single-building night routes before you stop.

• Quiet mode at 61 dB(A). About the level of normal conversation, so you can scrub during open hours.

• Easy tank and battery access. A wide recovery tank opening with a debris basket, and the batteries sit right under the seat.

• One-touch controls. One button lowers the deck and squeegee, and the display shows hours and solution level.

What's in the Box, Pads, Brushes and Running Costs

Every MicroRider ships with four 6 V batteries, the onboard charger, the pad holder for its deck, the operator manual with parts list and the charger manual. Floor pads are bought separately. The Disc 26 takes two 13-inch pads or brushes, and we carry the genuine Clarke 13-inch pad driver ($139.38 each) and 13-inch disc brushes from $65.59 each. The BOOST 28 takes one 14 x 28 inch rectangular pad, the same size as the Focus II BOOST 28 walk-behind, and Clarke offers it in red, blue, black, white and maroon, plus sanding screens. Our Clarke BOOST pads in 14 x 28 start at $50.72 for a case of five.

Plan for a few wear items. The standard squeegee blades are polyurethane and can be turned over to a fresh edge before you replace them. Rinse the squeegee, pads and recovery tank daily, and keep the solution filter and vacuum filter clean. Clarke asks for a carbon brush check on the motors at an authorized service center once a year. Nilfisk treats pads, brushes, pad holders and squeegee blades as wear items, not covered except for manufacturing defects.

Why You Should Consider a Clarke Floor Scrubber

Clarke is one of Nilfisk's commercial floor care brands, so parts and service run through Nilfisk's network of authorized service centers. Nilfisk covers rider scrubbers for 3 years parts, 3 years labor and 1 year travel, and covers wet and AGM batteries for 12 months against manufacturer defects. We're an authorized Clarke retailer, so that warranty is yours from day one. See all our ride-on floor scrubbers and Clarke floor scrubbers.

Clarke Focus II MicroRider Specifications by Deck

*Without batteries, tanks empty. **With the largest batteries, a full solution tank and the operator, as listed in Clarke's brochure. Rated productivity is at 3.7 mph in a straight line.