tile sealing

Restoring an Edwardian Quarry Tiled Bathroom Floor in Braunstone

This is a job I recently completed in the small town of Braunstone, which lies just outside the city boundaries of Leicester, Leicestershire. My client wanted a restorative cleaning and sealing service for their very old Quarry tiled bathroom floor, which dates back to the Edwardian period. The floor was suffering from paint and adhesive staining, and was now in dire need of a thorough clean more generally along with a fresh seal to protect it from further damage.

Quarry Tiled Floor Before Restorative Cleaning and Sealing Braunstone

Cleaning an Edwardian Quarry tiled floor

I treated the floor in the first instance Tile Doctor Remove & Go which is a powerful stripper that breaks down old sealers remaining on the floor, as well as inherent paint and adhesive contamination. Remove & Go also contains cleaning properties which allows it to draw out ingrained dirt from the stone, lifting it to the surface. The product was applied to the floor and allowed to dwell for approximately thirty minutes prior to agitation with a hand-held rotary polisher fitted with a small black stripping pad.

The resulting slurry was promptly removed using a wet vacuum machine and our specialist Tile Doctor Acid Gel was then applied to the floor. Acid Gel is a blend of phosphoric and hydrochloric acids in gel form, and is specially formulated to treat grout haze and efflorescence on both wall and floor tiles.

Readers should be aware that this product is not suitable for use on acid-sensitive stone tiles such as Marble, Limestone and Travertine as it can potentially cause severe etching. In this case Acid Gel was left to dwell for ten minutes prior to agitation. This was effective in removing the white efflorescence salt staining that was present in several concentrated areas. Once again, the resulting slurry was vacuumed away, and the entire floor was rinsed with clean water.

Sealing an Edwardian Quarry tiled floor

The floor was left to dry for roughly twenty four hours before I returned to seal the floor. My choice of sealer in this case was Tile Doctor Colour Grow, a colour enhancing, impregnating sealer. The sealer will help to protect the tiles from soil ingress, and both water and oil based spills.

Quarry Tiled Floor After Restorative Cleaning and Sealing Braunstone
As you can see from the ‘Before’ and ‘After’ photographs, a marked difference was made to the appearance of this Quarry tiled floor. A professional and carefully thought out approach was taken to tackling the innate problems, particularly relating to efflorescence and paint and adhesive staining, and my client was extremely pleased with the results.

Restoring the appearance of Edwardian Quarry tiled bathroom floor in Leicestershire

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Old Victorian Tiled Floor Restored In A Hinckley Public House

Here’s a really interesting commercial job for you, which I recently completed in the town of Hinckley, Leicestershire. I was asked to take a look at a Victorian Geometric and Encaustic tiled floor in the historic Queen’s Head pub.

This floor is over a century old and although in good condition for its age had suffered significant wear over the years, along with some cracked tiles and slight inherent moisture issues. What the pub landlord requested was a restorative clean to alleviate the aesthetically damaging effect of the wear, and to enhance the natural colours of the stone. I was also asked to seal the floor following the clean to achieve a semi-gloss finish.

Victorian Tiled Public House Floor Before Cleaning in Hinckley

Cleaning an old Victorian tiled floor

The first step in the cleaning process was to mix a strong solution of one part Tile Doctor Pro-Clean to four parts clean water. Pro-Clean is a high alkaline cleaner which also contains stripping properties, allowing it to break down old sealer and tackle heavy soil build-up. The solution was applied to the floor and left to dwell for 15 minutes, giving it times to seep into the stone, get underneath the dirt and lift it to the surface.

I addressed several paint spots and areas suffering from glue contamination by using Tile Doctor Remove & Go, which is specially formulated to break down paint and adhesives on unpolished natural stone floors, amongst others. The entire floor was then scrubbed using a special floor cleaning pad, and the resulting slurry was vacuumed away using a wet-vac machine.

The final issue to deal with was the inherent efflorescence staining. This was treated using Tile Doctor Grout Clean-Up, an acid-based product which removes not just efflorescence but also grout haze, mineral deposits, and rust stains. The solution here was one part Grout Clean-Up diluted with four parts water.

After completing the clean, I thoroughly rinsed the floor with clean water to remove any trace of cleaning product and dried the floor as much as possible with a wet vacuum, then before leaving for the day i installed a couple of air movers to assist with drying overnight.

Sealing an old Victorian tiled floor

Upon my return the following day, I checked the floor for any excess moisture before sealing it with our topical, semi-gloss finish sealer, known as Seal & Go Extra which due to its formula is ideal for external or old internal floors where there is unlikely to be damp from membrane.

This unique product provides excellent protection, and allows the tiles to breath where floors are suffering from inherent moisture issues. It is suitable for both internal and external use, on Victorian floor tiles, Sandstone, Flagstones, Terracotta, and rough Slate.

Victorian Tiled Public House Floor After Cleaning in Hinckley
As you can see from the photo, I was able to fulfil my client’s request to a high standard, bringing the pub’s old yet characterful Victorian tiled floor back to life again.

Commercial floor cleaning and sealing at a Public House in in Leicestershire

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Polished Marble Kitchen Floor Refreshed in Melton Mowbray

The photographs before are of Marble floor installed in the kitchen of a house in Melton Mowbray, that we recently refinished. The honed matte marble tiles had previously been finished with a water-based topical floor sealer by the customer to create a polished finish; unfortunately the coating had become damaged, worn and now soiled.

To restore the finish with something more durable we recommended the removal of any remaining coatings, then re-finishing with our restorative diamond encrusted burnishing pad system and then re-sealing with an impregnating rather than topical sealer. Our quote was accepted and we returned on the agreed date to restore the floor.

Marble Floor Before Cleaning and Polishing Melton Mowbray

Deep Cleaning Marble Tile and Grout

The first step was to remove the old coating and clean the grout using a strong dilution of Tile Doctor Pro-Clean which is a strong alkaline formula that is safe to use on stone. The solution was scrubbed into the grout using a stiff brush and also worked into the Marble floor using a rotary machine fitted with a black scrubbing pad. The now dirty cleaning solution was then rinsed away using water and extracted with a wet vacuum.

Burnishing a Marble Tiled Floor

The next step was to burnish the floor using a set of Tile Doctor burnishing pads starting with a coarse pad to strip the Marble back and then moving onto the finer grit pads from medium to extra fine to re-build the polish. The pads are lubricated with a little water and you need to rinse the floor after each pad.

Sealing the Marble Floor

We left the floor to dry overnight and then came back the next day to seal the floor with Tile Doctor Ultra Seal which is a premium, no-sheen, natural-look impregnating sealer formulated to provide maximum stain protection and recommended for food preparation areas, two coats were sufficient.

Marble Floor After Cleaning and Polishing Melton Mowbray
Once completed we recommend that the floor was maintained using Tile Doctor Stone Soap which is an after care cleaning solution designed for honed or polished stone floors.

Re-Polishing Marble Floor in Melton Mowbray

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