Corby Tile Cleaning Archives - Northamptonshire Tile Doctor

Limestone Tiled Kitchen Floor Renovation Geddington

Pitted Limestone Floor Deep Cleaned, Polished, Filled and Sealed in Geddington

This client from Geddington called me in to renovate their Limestone tiled floor which had been installed throughout much of the ground floor. Limestone like any natural stone is porous and will suffer from ingrained dirt if the sealer isn’t maintained, so it’s not unusual to need work like this doing every three to five years.

Limestone Tiled Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Geddington

I visited the property to survey the tiles and could see the stone had quite a lot of surface pitting which was trapping dirt and making it very difficult to keep clean. Pitting is quite common in this type of stone, and they are usually filled at the factory, however the filler can become dislodged with wear and the problem can be made worse by the use of acidic cleaning products.

Limestone Tile Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Geddington

Limestone Tiled Steps Before Cleaning Geddington

After surveying the floor, I came up with a comprehensive renovation plan that included deep cleaning the stone, filling the pits, polishing, and then sealing. I also made a note to discuss aftercare cleaning at the end so the floor wouldn’t get so bad in future.

Happy with my plan and quote a date was agreed for the work to commence.

Cleaning a Pitted Limestone Tiled Kitchen Floor

It was a large floor so to minimise disruption to the owner I split the job up into several areas and worked through the following process.

Work started with a general clean of the floor using Tile Doctor Pro-Clean with a focus on cleaning the grout. I used a strong dilution of Pro-Clean, left it to soak into the stone and grout for around ten minutes and then scrubbed it into the floor using a black pad fitted to a rotary machine. I also ran a stiff grout brush along the grout lines to get them as clean as possible. Once done the floor was rinsed and the soiling extracted with a wet vacuum.

The next step was to hone the Limestone using a set of diamond encrusted burnishing pads. These pads are great for bringing up the polish on a stone floor like this and you start with a coarse 400-grit pad fitted to a rotary floor buffer. Water is used to lubricate the process and the pads are run over each tile three or four times. The floor is then rinsed and extracted as before, and the process repeated with the 800 and then 1500 grit pads.

Once done the floor was looking much cleaner and brighter and ready for the next step which was to fill the pits. To do this I inspected the floor, identifying all the areas that needed attention and then filled those holes with a resin filler that is colour matched to the stone.

Sealing a Pitted Limestone Tiled Kitchen Floor

The last step was to seal the limestone and for this I used Tile Doctor Ultra-Seal which is an impregnating sealer that soaks into the stone, occupying the pores of the stone and thereby preventing dirt from residing there. Sealing keeps the dirt on the surface where it can easily be cleaned away. Ultra-Seal doesn’t contain any colour enhancers, so it leaves the stone with a very natural appearance which is what my client wanted.

Limestone Tile Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Geddington

Limestone Tiled Steps After Cleaning Geddington

The floor was transformed by the work and my client was very happy with the result, they even went to the trouble to leave the following review:

“We are absolutely delighted with the work undertaken by Philip, the Northamptonshire Tile Doctor. He has completely transformed very dirty limestone floors into something of great beauty – better than new. Philip was a pleasure to deal with throughout and we can highly recommend him.”

Limestone Tiled Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Geddington

With regards to aftercare cleaning, I recommended they use Tile Doctor Stone Soap which is designed for cleaning polished stone floors and helps maintain the patina.

Professional Restoration of a Limestone Tiled Floor in Northamptonshire

Pitted Limestone Floor Deep Cleaned, Polished, Filled and Sealed in Geddington Read More »

Power Washing Paving Slabs in Great Oakley

1 Comment / Corby Tile Cleaning, Work History / Philip Vissian / cleaning services, floor restoration, Great Oakley, northamptonshire, outdoor tile cleaning, paving slabs, power washing, tile cleaning, tile maintenance, tiled floor

This was a straight forward request to Power Wash Paving Slabs outside a house in Great Oakley. I wouldn’t normally add this to my blog however it occurred to me that a lot of my customers don’t realise Tile Doctor’s have invested in high pressure equipment that can be used externally as well as internally. In the photograph below you will see a picture of our van which contains a very high pressure truck mounted cleaning system which can generates pressures far in excess of a domestic system.

Tile Doctor Northamptonshire Truck Mounted Pressure Cleaning

Cleaning Paving Slabs

You can see from the photographs below that we were able to cut through the soil and grime built up on the surface of the tiles without too much trouble, fortunately these were large slabs as you do have to be careful around the joints where too much power can dislodge the mortar in-between the slabs. Also working outside does have the added advantage that there is a lot less preparation to do to protect other surfaces. It wasn’t necessary in this case but if you do struggle to clean paving slabs yourself you should apply a strong dilution of Tile Doctor Pro-Clean first and then let it soak in before scrubbing it in with a stiff brush, brick acid cleaners that you can buy in the DIY stores are very strong and you have to be very careful with them where as Pro-Clean is an alkaline product.