gym clean-up

[flipflopdelaney]

I need help! The parent association is trying to figure out a way to clean up the 8+ years of chalk accumulation in the gym. The 9,200 square-foot gym is located in a warehouse with very high open ceilings. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

 

[Tuduri]

Dear Flipflopdelany:

Isn't this the owner's responsibility?

 

[GymMom68]

That is definitely the gym owner's responsibility, why would you consider paying ANYTHING to have that done? Or take part in doing it yourselves? If you pay tuition, your children should have a decent, clean, safe gym to work out in, period.

 

[flipflopdelaney]

I completely agree that the gym owner should provide a clean gym but I don't mind finding out information about a thorough cleaning of the gym to present to the ownership. I got a price to clean the carpeted areas but would like to know what company to call to have them suck out all the chalk on the walls/rafters, etc. Any ideas?

Thanks for any assistance you can provide.

 

[Marge Simpson]

Gym clean up

I need help! The parent association is trying to figure out a way to clean up the 8+ years of chalk accumulation in the gym. The 9,200 square-foot gym is located in a warehouse with very high open ceilings. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

Hi flipflopdelaney,

First, let me say I agree it's the gym owner's responsibility. Of course, so is setup/breakdown for meets, budgeting for equipment, and many other things that appeared in the thread on what gyms expect of parents. So it's not all that surprising that a parent association would be asked to research it.

Have you considered asking an industrial painting contractor for an estimate? This sounds like the type of work that could be painting prep. From your description of the gym, it sounds like scaffolding or an indoor cherry-picker would be needed, so other trades that use those sorts of things might be interested. Maybe commercial window-washers? Flag or banner hangers?

Best of luck to you!

 

[JBS]

I need help! The parent association is trying to figure out a way to clean up the 8+ years of chalk accumulation in the gym. The 9,200 square-foot gym is located in a warehouse with very high open ceilings. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Thank you!

How bad is it? Do you have any pictures to post.

It is definitely the owner's responsibility. Whether the owner has his staff clean, hires a cleaning company, or gets volunteer parent's makes no difference as long as it gets clean. Some gyms offer breaks in tuition for your cleaning services. If parent's and staff do not want to help clean, then tuition should be raised and staff wages should be smaller.

Here's an idea from someone that has cleaned a ceiling before....don't. The 8 years of chalk will be back in 8 days. Spending all the time and money to clean all the chalk off is really not worth it unless you have a plan to minimize it in the future. Things like air filtration (chalk eaters), proper chalk buckets, carpet cleaning (steam) schedule.

One of our gyms has a chalk eater right between the bars by the chalk bucket....works great. The link is below:

Link Removed

You will need at least 2 of these for your gym.

 

[Marge Simpson]

gym clean up

JBS,

Would you share your experience with cleaning the ceiling? Thanks!

 

[JBS]

JBS,

Would you share your experience with cleaning the ceiling? Thanks!

I just used a shop vac with a whole bunch of extra hoses. I only got part of it finished...it was dangerous...and it took forever. I put the ladder up 1 month later and there was already a nice layer of chalk in the cleaned area.

I also tried dusting the rafters off with a broom and sweeping it off the floor. That made a huge mess.

 

[flipflopdelaney]

Thank you so much for the valuable information on this topic. I received a price to extract the carpets and I'll pass the chalk eater information on to the gym owners. We have some very talented gymnasts with asthma and I'd like to make sure the gym is as clean as it can be to minimize asthma triggers.

I really appreciate all the input--thank you everyone for sharing.

 

[gymbabisMom]

wow, that chalkeater thing looks really useful. We (the staff) try to keep our gym well vacuumed and mop the mats down weekly. But chalk is still everywhere. When our original coach/owner was still alive but in the hospital, all the employees and a bunch of parents got together and did a thorough cleaning of the gym. We took out everything that could be pressure washed, vacuumed, swept and mopped everything that couldn't be pressure washed and had the entire gym painted. While we have kept up on the cleaning and the gym is way cleaner than it had been for years, the chalk still gets everywhere and sometimes when I walk in after being out of the gym for a bit I can see huge clouds of it just hovering in the air like smog. I'm going to tell the new owner about the chalkeater. Her dd has asthma so I'm sure she will see the value in something like that.

 

[gymgymgymnast08]

We clean up our gym after EVERY practice meaning we take all the equipment down and put it away. So we kinda will clean up the chalk then if we need to

 

[Anna]

Some hints:
Always start from the top down - there's no point in getting the floors steam cleaned, and then getting all the crap off the rafters. It'll just get messy again.

Always take as much equipment as you can out of the gym first

Chalk eaters/other sorts of humidifers are excellent - see if you can leave them in the gym for a few days running to get rid of some chalk.

Deep chalk buckets are the BEST, and always teach kids (even rec) that when they rub or clap their hands, to do it in the bottom half of the bowl. That means less chalk flies.

The more often you clean your gym, the better. Ours is vacuumed daily (fortunately, we're attached at a few other professional institutions that have cleaners for us). Wipe down your mats when they get sweaty. Painting your walls is a great way of reducing chalk mess (and you have to sugar soap before you paint).

Basically set aside a week or two once or twice a year, when all the gymnasts are on break, and clean the entire gym. But clean the gym as you go throughout the year (including the pit...once a month is optimal!), and then it makes it so much easier.