2010 January | Stonecare TV

Quarry Tile Restoration

Today’s post is a quick movie of one of the recent quarry tile restoration projects undertaken using Stonecareuk products.

It’s always a wonderful experience when you unearth a hidden gem of a stone floor, unseen for decades, just waiting for someone to discover and for them to make the decision to lovingly and carefully restore it, to it’s former glory.

The Challenge was to revitalise a Victorian quarry tiled floor which has been covered by carpeting for the last few decades.

As you can imagine there were all kinds of challenges, including; glue residues, carpet gripper rods stuck to the floor, tiles missing and of course tiles discoloration.

Preparation is always important with any tile restoration programme and the first job was to protect all neighbouring walls, doors & surrounding areas.

The cleaning process commenced by firstly using Wax & Residue Remover to break down the glue, surface residues and any previous surface treatments. As you’ll see, the process cleaned the quarry tiles to an excellent standard.

The whole of the tiled area was rinsed cleaned and neutralized using Natural Stone Cleaner in readiness for sealing.

Once the quarry tiles had completely dried the complete area was professionally and carefully sealed with three thinly coated applications of Natural Stone Sealer allowing adequate drying time between each coat.

Natural Stone Sealer was applied to ensure the stone received a deep protection. This also acted as an excellent base coat for Natural Stone Gloss (the client requested a high shine) which is the treatment used to create a beautiful hi-gloss finish.

Once the base coats of Natural Stone Sealer were completely dry this was followed by applying three thin coats of Natural Stone Gloss.

The quarry tiles were allowed to totally dry for 24 hours and the process was completed by burnished with our ultra high speed machine, as you can see this gave instant and amazing results.

Mike

www.stonecareuk.co.uk
www.nulifestonecare.co.uk
www.nulifefloorcare.co.uk
www.stonecare.tv

Filed under: Blog,General,Quarry Tiles — Mike @ 11:52 am

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Sealing Porcelain, seal porcelain

A question i get asked all the time is “should you seal porcelain tiles”.

Well, porcelain is becoming a very popular stone for both domestic and commercial clients. It looks great, has a long life and is relatively easy to maintain. Whether it is polished or honed porcelain, its a fantastic and very practical stone to have on a floor.

However, recently i have been called out to view more and more problems on porcelain floors and there seems to be some confusion as to whether to impregnate / seal porcelain tiles or not.

In my opinion you can’t take chances. Sealing/impregnating of porcelain is absolutely vital. Sealing porcelain should be undertaken with a solvent based impregnator, specifically formulated for use on less porous stones such as ceramic & porcelain.

I recommend this to be applied prior to, and after grouting. Why? because I have seen numerous porcelain floors where the grout has bled into this so called “non-porous stone”, causing permanent damage. Look out for my upcoming episode on Stonecare.tv. regarding grout bleeding on polished porcelain (Grout Residue Removers).

So, in answer to the question “Do porcelain tiles need sealing” its a massive YES from me.

The impregnator you chose, should ideally be specifically formulated for low porosity stones and you may need to a apply very thin coats, removing any surface residues as you go (details can be found at www.stonecareuk.co.uk)

Thanks for reading and keep watchin Mike

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Nc9acpds3w

Filed under: Blog,General,Impregnators & Sealers,Porcelain — Mike @ 3:31 pm

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Natural Stone – Mike Interviews Nu-Life’s Latest Franshisee

Mike Interviews Ray Pullen from StonecareTV on Vimeo.

Ray Pullen in the latest addition to the Nu-Life Stone Care franchise network, Ray has taken on the Surrey areas where he will be undertaking all types of natural stone restoration, natural stone cleaning and natural stone maintenance. Ray,s services will include, marble polishing, limestone polishing, travertine cleaning, travertine polishing, limestomne sealing, marble sealing, and much more contact ray at www.nulifestonecare-surrey.co.uk

Filed under: Blog,General — Mike @ 11:18 pm

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Marble Polishing, A 5 star marble polishing project

Nu-Life Gives 5 Star Hotel A 5 Star Floor

After seven years of the hotel being open, the natural limestone floor in reception was in need of some real attention. The floor had being polished and buffed and polished and buffed on a daily basis for years but never really cared for. The main traffic areas we worn and dull looking with heavy scratching and scuffing throughout.

After working with Nu-Life for many years the management teams remittance to us is that we are a 5 star hotel and want a 5 star floor.

The restoration project began, working in a busy 5 star hotel there are many things to be considered the most important being health and safety and the hotel guests, our treatments were carried out over a 5 day period starting at 05.00 am and finishing at 12.30pm during these times our health and safety systems were vital hotel guest and staff had to be fully aware of where we were working and our plan of attack.

It was also important for us to fully complete sections of the lobby flooring before moving to the next, as we needed to keep our working place to a minimum, After each section was complete and the restored mirror finish areas got bigger and bigger this gave the staff and guests an idea of how it would look when completed.

After the floors were fully restored the feed back for all involved was amazing the Lowry reception floor now look new again and nu-life are very proud to have brought the floors back to life and are now heavily involved in the daily maintenance keeping the Lowry Hotel looking 5 Star at all times. www.nulifefloorcare.co.uk

Mike

Filed under: Blog,General,Marble — Mike @ 5:11 pm

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Sandstone Cleaning, Sandstone Restoration

Hi, i hope everyone is OK and is back in the swing of things after the snow here in the UK. here at nu-life stone care we are undertaking many different types of stone restoration jobs all the time, from small domestic to large commercial, i have attached a quick movie of a recent sandstone restoration job undertaken in a commercial office block in the center of Manchester.

The sandstone floor was only 2 years old but had not been impregnated or sealed when new, so our plan of attach was to strip, clean, neutralize and dry the floor bringing it back to life before applying Stain-Gard SB (Impregnator) to give the stone protection from both water and oil, helping massively with the daily maintenance of the sandstone floor.

As you will see there was a massive difference and our client is over the moon, plus we have specified a ongoing maintenance plan to ensure the sandstone floor looks great all year round.