Sealer / finish for Saltillo

[alazo1]

I have a job this comming week. It has wax and tested with stripper ok. The tile is not factory sealed so from what I understand a sealer should go in before the floor finish. Is the maintenance easier with a wax finish? or should I just put a sealer with a gloss?.

It's indoors, 6 year install. Kitchen , Family room combo.

Pics
Kitchen area

Tested tile. this thing is so porous once stripped.

thanks for any help,
Albert

 

[J Scott W]

Any topical coating will be high maintenance. The coating will wear in the traffic paths and need to be refinished. A sealer with some gloss to it would last longer between re-do. If they want to go for a high gloss, make sure they expect regular on-going maintenance.

a glossy, topical treatment could also pose an increased slip and fall hazrd when the floor is wet.

Either a topical finish or an impregnating sealer would make daily cleaning easier because the floor would not be as porous.

With a porous floor, I would strip and apply a couple or three thins coats of sealer. This gives good protection and a slight gloss.

 

[floorguy]

albert...i found the location that has the stuff i talked about...

here is a link

http://maps.yahoo.com/#mvt=h&lat=37.703 ... CA%2094550

dont know how far of a drive it would be..

 

[alazo1]

With a porous floor, I would strip and apply a couple or three thins coats of sealer. This gives good protection and a slight gloss.

This is the way I would have saltillo if it was in my own home. Wax buildup takes away from the look of the stone but who am I, she wants it shinny and would have it no other way.

Doug, I tried looking for the product when I got home after we talked to no avail. Ron suggested a product he uses and ordered it today. Thanks for looking that up. Does the manf. have a website for future reference?.

Just a strip and seal right?. I remember a small test I did on a coated travertine that ended up taking twice as long. :shock:

I have a helper for this one and might have time to play around with a few minor repairs if they show up.
The customer has left over tile. I wanted to grind a bit of it up to fill a few gouges that I'm sure will be there. What do I mix this dust with that dries fast. I was thinking on the day of the seal this can be done if it's mixed with some type of fast drying epoxy. It's not part of the job just thought I'd get some experience with minor repairs.

Albert

 

[Larry Cobb]

Albert;

I use a 30 minute Epoxy plus the ground-up stone as a good repair paste.

I have done that with good results.

Larry Cobb

 

[TimP]

Never put wax on tile with grouth....you're asking for trouble later on. I want to knock every fool who uses wax on grout around here in the head.

Use something made for grout and tile not something made for vct or vinyl floors.

 

[safeclean]

Saltillo how to do it

Strip it with Barebones and a side-to-side machine, with brush, didn't work so well, so switched over to black stripper pads, we're really not sure which worked better.

Then rinsed with the turbo turned way down. Had to strip twice as there was quite a bit of left over wax (shiney spots) the first time. There were a few after the second stripping, but they evened out with the wax.

During this stripping process, we hand scrubbed the areas of efflorescence with AquaMix Sulfamic Acid. We also scrubbed all the base tiles - which only came so-so....

We then neutralized the floors, and applied AquaMix Eff-Ex treatment to pre-treat the floors to inhibit Efflorescense. Waited about 18 hours.

We applied 3 coats of AquaMix penetrating sealer and 4 coats of AquaMix Floor shine & hardener. Waiting 1/2 hour between sealer & 1 hour between Floor Shine & Hardener.

Total, this job took us (2 people) parts of 3 days. About 22 hours working time. Which looking back we see where we could have cut off about 1 day. But for two old people who have never done this type of floor before, and haven't worked for 3 years, we thought it wasn't too bad.

 

[Fon Johnson]

If they insist on a floor finish type of sealer for shine, Spartan's Terraglaze works really well. I've never used it on Saltillo, but we have used it on terrazzo, concrete, ceramic, slate, etc. It is designed for such non-resilient surfaces (hence the name) and it is about as durable as you will get for a "floor finish" type of sealer. It will scratch, but it can give a nice shine without using a floor finish over it. It also strips fairly easy, which is a big plus.

I agree about finish in grout lines being a pain, but many insist on it. I just explain that by the nature of the beast, we cannot ever get all of the sealer/finish out of the grout and it may be splotchy after stripping. Most still insist on it.. Oh well..

 

[boazcan]

These people specialize in Satillo products


http://www.roval.com

 

[alazo1]

I'm finally done with this nightmarish job. Thanks Doug, Ron and Mike for your info and support. I talked to Mike one day thinking I ruined this freaken floor. "Nah, just do bla, and bla, and bla, and you'll be fine".

My biggest concern still is with mixed answers. This was raw super saltillo. It has what I guess is called "sun spots" which is one of the things that gives this tile a unique character. Slight variation in color mostly from orange to an amber on some of the tiles. This layer appears to be only skin deep and seems like it can be damaged by too much aggression. I actually ran some 600 grit sandpaper on one that the client gave me to take home and it did change the color to look more like the bottom of the tile (orange). See pic.

On the second stripping we started to see some clay in the slurry which is when I decided to stop to try and figure out if this is right. There was some old dried wax stuck on some of the tiles creating brown streaks that had to be taken out. We went a little nuts on the stripping and messed up by having areas dry before extracting. Rookie mistake.

On the third day I decided to scrub with sulfamic acid and a black pad and did good at taking most of the brown crap out. Turbo, dried, sealed collected money and got the hell out of there. Hopefully next time it will be easier

Color change by 600 grit sandpaper

Back of same tile. Humm, I see a color change there too

Before last coat

Albert

 

[Ron Lippold]

good job al that floor will look cherry for a long time

 

[safeclean]

Nice job Albert you will always get clay color in your slurry this is normal do not worry about it. Looks great

Craig

 

[Fon Johnson]

Looks nice, Albert!

Those variations and nuances from tile to tile are natural. That is what gives the tile is beauty and character.

 

[alazo1]

I'm screwed now !!

Went back today and the sealer failed on some tiles. Bare spots on about 10 of them. I put some sealer in and told the lady I'll be back next week to see the outcome. I'm not sure it's effloresence, will post some pics soon.

Maybe I'll just move into her freakin garage.

Albert

 

[Fon Johnson]

Efflorescene will look white under the finish. Did you give it enough dry time? It is possible that trapped moisture will cause sealer failure.