sealing

Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff

Badly Stained Quarry Tiles Deep Cleaned and Sealed in Splott

These Quarry tiles at a house in Splott, a small town not too far from the city of Cardiff, had certainly endured a hammering after what appeared to be recent decoration in the room. The tiles were heavily soiled, with sand and cement mixed up and splattered across the floor, along with deep paint and plaster stains.

Quarry Tiles Before Restoration in Splott Cardiff
Quarry Tiles Before Restoration in Splott Cardiff

The customer had already scraped off as much of the cement and other stubborn stains off – as much as they could, at least. Quarry may be typically hard wearing, but this doesn’t necessarily mean it’s any easier to clean when it gets into a bad way. Eager to find a solution to the problem, the customer found Tile Doctor via the Internet, and not long after we arranged for me to come down to the property to see what could be done.

Quarry Tiles Before Restoration in Splott Cardiff Quarry Tiles Before Restoration in Splott Cardiff
Quarry Tiles Before Restoration in Splott Cardiff

Upon arriving at the property and giving the tiles an initial inspection, I explained that not all stains and marks will come off or out of the tiles, as some staining is simply permanent. Nonetheless, the customer indicated they would be satisfied with any improvement made to the condition of the floor. Having restored tiles similar to these before, I knew that the results could still come off very well using the right methods and products.

Cleaning a Stained Quarry Tiled Floor

To begin I mixed a strong solution of Tile Doctor NanoTech HBU and Pro Clean, a combination of two different cleaners. Pro Clean is a versatile, high alkaline cleaner that is used to deal with reasonably heavy soil build-up on natural stone floors. It also contains stripping properties that allow it to start breaking down any old sealers when left to dwell on the tiles. NanoTech HBU takes the cleaning process a step further: it is specially formulated to use nano-sized cleaning particles to reach dirt and stains deeply ingrained in the stone, before dissolving and lifting them out.

This solution was applied to the floor and, working in small sections, I scrubbed it into the tiles using a rotating scrubbing machine fitted with a nylon brush attachment. The floor was then rinsed, and the resulting cleaning slurry was vacuumed away using a wet-vax machine.

My next concern was the grout, which was afflicted by stubborn cement marks. I opted to remove these firstly by carefully applying Tile Doctor Grout Clean Up, an acid-based cleaner. Some cement marks remained despite the application, and so I attempted to manually scrape and chisel them away. While I had some good success, as mentioned not all cement stains can be removed, especially if they have been there for a long time. Some old cement mixture is as hard as flint!

Sealing a Quarry Tiled Floor

I left the floor to dry following the clean and came back two days later to seal the tiles, checking first that they were dry by taking multiple readings with the damp meter, and comparing them with earlier results.

The test results came back fine, so I started with the lengthy task of applying eight coats of Tile Doctor Seal and Go sealer. Having sealed similar floors with Seal and Go before I knew the results would be very desirable, with the deep natural colours in the stone being enhanced by the product. Seal and Go is my preferred sealer for Quarry tiles as it helps disguise some permanent marks and adds a durable satin shine finish.

Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff
Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff

While unfortunately a stained floor like this will never be able to look good as new, the results I managed to achieve were very pleasing. Certainly there was no evidence left of recent decoration, with the vast majority of the stains and marks no longer damaging the appearance of the tiles. The fresh seal has really brought out the red and black checked pattern in the floor. Needless to say the customer’s expectations were exceeded!

Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff
Quarry Tiles After Restoration in Splott Cardiff

Professional Tile Cleaning and Sealing for a Badly Stained and Soiled Quarry Tiled Floor Restoration in South Wales

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Quarry Tiled Floor After Restoration near Caerphilly Castle

Quarry and Terrazzo floors restored near Caerphilly Castle

The owner of this residence near Caerphilly Castle had discovered a 150x150mm red Quarry tiled floor in the kitchen which dated back to before 1900 and had unfortunately been tiled over by a previous owner. Keen on restoring such an original feature the owner set about removing the tiles on top using a chisel and scraping off the adhesive, it was at this point we got the call to assist.

Quarry Tiled Floor Before Restoration near Caerphilly Castle

Restoring a Quarry Tiled Floor

Before proceeding my first job is to always check the moisture levels, many of these old floors have no damp proof membrane so without taking a base reading it’s tricky to know if the floor has thoroughly dried later. The kitchen was being replaced and the old kitchen had been removed so I was able to work on the restoration before the new one had been installed making the task easier.

Quarry Tiled Floor Before Restoration near Caerphilly Castle
To clean the floor I realised I would need a strong cleaning solution to get these old Quarry tiles clean so I diluted Tile Doctor Pro-Clean 50:50 with Heavy Build-up Remover or Tile Doctor NanoTech HBU as we like to call it. This was applied to a wet floor and scrubbed in using a scrubbing machine fitted with a coarse back pad running on slow speed. I rinsed the floor every so often so I could see the difference and discovered my choice of cleaning product has proved to be effective and fast. Before long I was happy to rinse away the now soiled cleaning solution satisfied that I could not improve the tiles any further with more cleaning.

Quarry Tiled Floor During Restoration near Caerphilly Castle

Sealing a Quarry Tiled Floor

I left the floor to dry for 24h hours before returning to seal the tiles. On my return I checked the moisture levels and there were some high readings so using a heat gun I applied some gentle heat to the tiles allowing them to cool before checking again. This did the trick and the second reading was much better so I proceeded to seal the tiles using Tile Doctor Seal and Go which I find works well on quarry tiles. The quarry tiles were quite worn and very porous and as result needed at nine coats of sealer before they were fully sealed. I do find multiple of coats of sealer works well on floors of this condition as it helped to hide the imperfections and marks caused by the chisel and scrapper.

Quarry Tiled Floor After Restoration near Caerphilly Castle
The owners were delighted with the results and asked me to come back and restore their terrazzo hallway floor which will be subject to another post.

Quarry Tiled floor restored in South Wales

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Old Flagstones After Restoration in Caerleon

18th Century Flagstone Floor Cleaned and Sealed in Caerleon

This flagstone floor was installed in a farmhouse in Caerleon near NewPort, it was actually the original floor dating back to 18th century and had been lifted up by the previous owners and re-laid with underfloor heating and a damp proof membrane, this was good news for me as so often with these old floors you can get damp issues rising up through the stone and consequently it can take a long time to dry out following a deep clean.

Old Flagstones Before Restoration in Caerleon

Cleaning Quarry Tiles

I stripped the sealer off with Tile Doctor HBU (Heavy Build-Up Remover) Ultra-Clean mixed 50/50 mixed with Tile Doctor Pro-Clean to double the cleaning and stripping power and also to thin the HBU out. The old sealer had been applied two years prior when then the floor was re-laid as part of a renovation due to the farm house going on the market for the sale, it had worn through in the heavy traffic areas letting in dirt and now needed to be replaced.

Old Flagstones Before Restoration in Caerleon Old Flagstones Before Restoration in Caerleon

To work the cleaning solution into the floor I used a scrubbing machine with a stiff brush attached cleaning and rinsing as I renovated, the old sealer proved quite tough to shift in some areas so the process had to be repeated until I was satisfied all the old sealer and dirt had been removed.

A lot of the cement joints had broken down which I repointed with fast setting Mapei floor grout colour matched to the original. One small piece of stone had to be replaced by the kitchen unit for which I managed to source a slab from B&Q after a hunt around from various outlets to match the original as best as possible.

Old Flagstone Tile Replacement in Caerleon

Sealing a Quarry Floor Sealing

I left the floor to dry out for two days checking later with a damp meter to ensure it was completely dry before sealing.

Old Flagstones During Sealing in Caerleon Old Flagstones After Restoration in Caerleon

The customer wanted a satin finish as previously sealed so I applied three coats of Tile Doctor Seal & Go which gave the stone floor a nice mild shine and being water based didn’t leave smell whilst it dried.

Old Flagstones After Restoration in Caerleon
 

Old Flagstone Tiled Kitchen floor Deep Cleaned and Sealed in South Wales

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