The photographs below are from the bathroom of a house in the Moston area of Manchester which is primarily residential and only 3 miles away from the city centre. My customer had been primarily concerned with the removal of unsightly mould but was also keen to have the grout in the ceramic tiled shower cubicle given a good deep clean.
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Cleaning a Ceramic Tiled Shower Cubicle
To clean the Shower Cubicle, I used a strong dilution of Tile Doctor Pro Clean which is a strong alkaline cleaner that works really well on grout. The Pro-Clean solution was decanted into a spray bottle and then sprayed onto the grout lines and left it to dwell. The air in the solution makes it lighter and easier for it to stick to vertical surfaces.
After a few minutes the Pro-Clean was scrubbed in using a stiff grout brush. The tiles were then rinsed with water to remove the soiled solution from the tiles and the process repeated where required.
Although cleaning process was a success there were still a few mould marks left so to tackle these I used Tile Doctor Mould Away spray using the same process of scrubbing and rinsing. The Mould Away spray did the trick for me and I moved on to remove the silicone around the shower cubicle. When removing silicone, you must make sure you get all mouldy silicone out otherwise it can spread from the old to the new.
After I had finished removing the silicone I tidied the shower cubicle and used a bit of gentle heat from my heat gun to dry the grout lines and edges where silicone used to be.
Grout Colouring a Ceramic Tiled Shower Cubicle
I used my damp tester to make ensure there was no dampness anywhere around the working area and then moved on to colouring the grout which would give the whole shower a fresh and consistent appearance. On this occasion, I used a White colour from the Tile Doctor range of Grout Colourant’s, it’s an epoxy based colourant that protects and rejuvenate the grout lines.
I had to use 2 coats of colourant to get the best result and then moved on to putting new silicone around the shower base with a high-quality mould resistant silicone. When finished adding fresh silicone I tidied up again and the job was complete.
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I think you can’t argue the shower cubicle was transformed and customer even said it looks better then when it was new; we also fixed few chips for her whilst there and stripped and replaced the silicone around the sink as a bonus.
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Whilst Mould Away and Pro-Clean will allow you to remove mould in most cases it won’t correct the underlying problem which is a lack on ventilation in the bathroom. However leaving a window open during showering or the bathroom door fully open after you have finished showering can improve ventilation and help reduce the problem.