Welcome back David Gelinas @ Moderator here

[Mikey P]

David is THE man when need some stone and grout advice.

Take full advantage of his presence here.

http://www.1800marbleguy.com/index.php


I would like to see his brother use his banner time to promote David's stuff as well.

 

[David Gelinas]

Mikey

Thank you, I really do appreciate that. I know I haven’t been around in the past as much as I wanted to but I’m thinking I’ll be able to be here more now and able to help out more. I figure it’s a two way street; if we all help out each other we’ll all make out better. I’ll of course be checking in more often and posting more but at the same time when I do see an interesting question posted by someone, many times someone else has already answered it. I try not to sound redundant but as they say, “Two heads are better than one”.

Looking forward to contributing and helping out where I can, I hope everyone feels free to ask if they have the need.

Take care,
David Gelinas
Marbleguy

 

[Mikey P]

David,

Lets say a CCer has a Turbo, a 175 and has cleaned a few dozen ceramic floors and now wants to get into stone cleaning and polishing. Where would you suggest he start with getting educated?

 

[Mr. P]

Hey Dave, I understand your not too far away from me. Do you teach any classes? I understand your the man to talk to!
Nick

 

[hogjowl]

Now I know why I haven't found the tile and grout room very interesting lately.

Welcome back.

 

[RickL]

This board continues to amaze me!!! Mike quite the Coup in getting Dave he is certainly a huge asset to any hard surface topic. Thanks Dave for taking the time out of your busy business to help (something you've always done for me) welcome.

 

[David Gelinas]

Hi Guys

Mike if a CCer has 175 & turbo he’s starting out a lot further ahead than I did. When I actually started doing stone I started with just powder polishing – using an old un-weighted Clark (but trust me, it was heavy enough), a wet vac and a couple of mop buckets. As for “cleaning” stone with the Turbo you’ll be fine, it just doesn’t pick up terribly well so you’ll need to mop afterwards to get the floor dry. I’d recommend going with a high pressure hard surface wand. I use a, I think its 12” or 14”s, Raptor for most hard surface work unless I’m going after the grout then I use my Turbo. If you want to just clean and even just use powders you’ll be fine with that set up. If you want to do restoration you’ll need more.

For restoration (diamond work) you can use a weighted swing machine, keep in mind though that going with a planetary machine like a Cimex will be a minimum of four times faster. In addition to that it is MUCH, MUCH easier from a fatigue point of view as well as from a skills point of view. Beyond that, having a way to move the diamonds/abrasives across the floor, and the things mentioned above you’ve pretty much got it covered. You’ll also want a way to do your edges, generally a variable speed hand grinder with 4” or 5” diamonds (In most instances I prefer using a Milwaukee 5540).

As for getting educated in stone; you can do it two ways: like me you could make it up as you go along OR get some actual training. I personally offer training here in St. Pete. (A three day class that covers just about every aspect of stone maintenance and restoration, 1 day classroom & 2 long days hands on) as well as a few others offer training around the country. (Nick, I think that also covered your question as well.)

One thing I try to get across in the class is this – “Stone is a rock; it came out of the ground. No matter what you do to it we can fix it.” Like I said, you can give it a go on your own and endure a rather long learning curve or benefit from some else’s trial and error. With as many types of stone that are out there and the possibilities of messing something up I’d strongly suggest getting some training.

Thank you also to RickL and to Marty for the kind words. It was nice having you come down Rick and working together a few years back.

David Gelinas
Marbleguy