We often use cornmeal on our floors to increase slide. Unfortunately the floor is not usually clean when we apply to cornmeal and some dancers have complained of "build up" on the soles of their suede shoes (this doesn not seem to be a problem with dance sneakers with hard plastic soles. Even with the "build up" I usually have no trouble sliding and using a wire brush and scraper takes the "build up" off the suede soles.
We use a "Parmesan cheese shaker" with adjustable holes in the top, to apply the cornmeal. Works great and we try to only sprinkle a little at a time and then a second time if we need to. Donna Hunt Web Site: donnahuntcaller.com Email: [email protected] -----Original Message----- From: James Saxe via Callers <[email protected]> To: callers <[email protected]> Sent: Tue, Jul 21, 2015 5:50 pm Subject: Re: [Callers] Sticky floors In my recent message about negatives of applying wax to a slow floor, I wrote: > ... > Note also that wax, unlike, say, corn meal, will not easily be > removed by sweeping at the end of the evening. As it happens, while looking for something else, I just came across a 2013 thread on the trad-dance-callers list where someone mentioned corn meal and another list member replied with a cautionary tale about a local dance series that ... > ... had to temporary relocate, and settled in a church basement which had a tile floor. The caller sprinkled corn meal over the floor in hopes of improving it since it had been waxed. > As the evening progressed, the crowded unairconditioned hall became quite hot & humid and the cornmeal grains absorbed the moisture, softening and sticking to the floor. > It couldn't be swept off after the dance. It had to be laboriously *scraped* off by the custodian on hands & knees. > > The dance was evicted from the church, never allowed to return. I'm not sure why the experience reported here differs from what I've seen with corn meal. Was it the humidity? Was it something about the underlying floor or about what had been done to it before the corn meal was added. (For example, had it not been well cleaned after an event the previous evening where people had dropped food and spilled sugary drinks?) Was it something about the kind of corn meal? Was it really corn starch? BUt I thought I should pass along the report. --Jim _______________________________________________ Callers mailing list [email protected] http://lists.sharedweight.net/listinfo.cgi/callers-sharedweight.net
