What is the difference between a floor polisher and a burnisher?

Speed is the whole distinction

Both machines spin a pad on a floor, so the names get used interchangeably on site. They are not interchangeable machines. A floor polisher — sometimes called a rotary or a single-disc — turns at low speed under its own weight: the PV25 and C25 run at 375 RPM, the Gen2 versions at 362–365 RPM, the compact A23HS at 375 RPM. At that speed the pad has time to bite, which is why the same machine will scrub, strip, shampoo carpet and drive a sanding disc.

A burnisher runs four to seven times faster. POLIVAC's electric SL1600 and SL2000 turn at 1,500 RPM, the battery Stealth at 2,000 RPM, and the LPG range from 1,500 RPM on the Gen II machines to 2,500 RPM on the Gazda models. Nothing at that speed can scrub — the pad skates. What it does instead is generate friction heat, which softens the top of the floor polish so it flows level and re-hardens as gloss.

What that means for the pad and the floor

Because a burnisher works by heat rather than abrasion, it needs a floor that already has a finish on it and a pad matched to the speed. Run a burnisher over an unsealed or badly soiled floor and it will polish the dirt in. Run a polisher over a floor that only needs its gloss brought back, and you will be there all afternoon for a duller result. The burnisher also carries defined pad pressure — 10 kg on the SL1600, SL2000 and Gas 38, 12 kg on the Stealth — because contact force at speed is what controls the finish.

When it matters

Buy the polisher first. If the site has one machine, it should be the low-speed one: it scrubs, it strips, it spray buffs, it drives a sanding or carpet-shampoo attachment, and it is the only one of the two that can prepare a floor rather than maintain it. A burnisher on its own can only maintain a finish that something else laid down.

Add the burnisher when gloss is the deliverable and the area is large — retail, supermarkets, showroom floors, hospital corridors on a nightly cycle. That is where the speed pays for itself, and where POLIVAC's LPG machines exist, because a cable becomes the limiting factor long before the pad does.

The common mistake is buying a burnisher to fix a floor that looks tired. If the finish is worn through or scratched to the substrate, more speed makes it worse — the answer is a strip and recoat with the polisher, then burnish to maintain what you have laid.