kitchen floor

Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor Cleaning and Sealing Manchester

20m2 Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor Manchester

A lovely lady from Manchester contacted us early in the new year about her beautiful Indian Slate floor that had been laid in her Kitchen 18 years ago. It turns out over Christmas, a leak occurred under the kitchen units and although the kitchen itself wasn’t flooded, water had seeped under the tiles and has caused them to look quite ‘cloudy.’ In addition, she explained there was also some flaking of the tile which happened when she had a new integrated dishwasher fitted a few months ago. Keen to have the problem resolved we were asked if we could possibly restore her once lovely floor to its former glory.

Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Manchester

After further discussion I paid a visit to the property to take a closer look. It was clear a mixture of impregnating sealers and topical sealers had been used previously. These had degraded due to wear and tear and the flood had left the floor looking damaged and patchy. The floor was around 20m2 and the slate was multi-coloured.

Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Manchester Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Manchester

I recommended carrying out a deep restorative clean of the slate tiles and grout to remove the old sealers and then re-seal to protect the floor going forward. I created a quote for the work which was accepted and a date set for the work to begin.

Cleaning an Indian Slate Tiled Kitchen Floor

I was wary the Slate tiles had been exposed to a lot of water previously, so I decided to do the initial clean with Tile Doctor Oxy-Gel which being in gel form is a low moisture cleaner. This was worked in with a silicon carbide brush fitted to a mechanical slow speed buffing machine and then extracted with a wet vacuum. This worked well but it was clear something stronger would be needed to remove all the sealer.

Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor During Cleaning Manchester

I next applied Tile Doctor Remove and Go which is a dedicated coatings remover and this was worked in using a coarse 100-grit pad. Except for the edges and grout lines which were hand cleaned, I used the buffer machine to work the product into the tile. All soils were then removed using a wet vacuum.

Next the area was neutralised by giving the floor an acid wash using Tile Doctor Acid Gel which was worked in using a 200-grit pad before rinsing with water, again all removed with a wet vacuum system. It was then left to fully dry overnight assisted by a couple of air blowers.

Sealing an Indian Slate Tiled Kitchen Floor

After sampling a couple of different sealers, it was agreed that Tile Doctor X-Tra Seal worked best to bring out the colour and give a low sheen to the floor. Just one coat was needed and after wiping off the excess sealer a white pad was used to finish with a short burnish.

My client was very happy with the result and left the following feedback.

“From start to finish, contact and communication with Tile Doctor has been straightforward and easy. Kevin explained in detail what renovating my Indian slate floor would require and consulted me on each step of the process. The work has been carried out in an extremely efficient and thorough manner. Kevin obviously knows his stuff! His communication and timekeeping skills are excellent and yes, I am obviously delighted with the renovation of my now beautiful kitchen floor.”
Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Sealing Manchester

For aftercare cleaning I recommended the use of Tile Doctor Neutral Tile Cleaner which is a mild but effective product that won’t affect the new sealer.

Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Sealing Manchester Multi-Coloured Indian Slate Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Sealing Manchester

 

Professional Restoration of an Indian Slate Tiled Kitchen in Greater Manchester

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Terrazzo Kitchen Tile Floor Before After Cleaning Manchester

Deep Cleaning Grubby Terrazzo Kitchen Tiles at Manchester Apartment

I recently visited a customer with a grubby Terrazzo tiled kitchen floor who lived in the Skyline Apartments in the centre of Manchester. Billed as luxury accommodation the building has a Gym and apparently a 20-metre swimming pool on the roof. The floor in the Kitchen was around 6m square and my customer originally thought the tiles were Limestone, but I was able to confirm they were Terrazzo, not that it mattered from my point of view as the cleaning process would be the same.

Terrazzo Kitchen Floor Before Cleaning Skyline Apartments Manchester

The previous owner of the apartment had never maintained the floor properly, so my customer inherited a very grubby Terrazzo floor and had tried getting rid of the dirt without much success. After running a few tests, I could see that that any protective sealer had long since failed and dirt was now ingrained in the pores of the tile. The tiles would now need to be burnished to restore the appearance and then sealed to protect it from ingrained dirt going forward.

Cleaning and Polishing a Terrazzo Tiled Floor

To get the floor clean and ensure what was left of the old sealer was removed I scrubbed a strong dilution of Tile Doctor Remove and Go into the tiles. This product works best if you leave it to dwell on the tile for around ten minutes before working it in. Afterwards the soiled product was removed using a wet vacuum which makes light work of extracting liquids from hard floors.

To burnish the Terrazzo, I used a set of Tile Doctor Burnishing pads which are applied to the floor using a rotary floor buffer running a slow speed in sequence from coarse to very fine. Lubricated with water this process uses a coarse pad to cut back through the tile to remove marks and ingrained dirt. This is followed by the medium and fine pads rinsing the floor with water in between each pad and extracting the soil with a wet vacuum. The last pad which is a 3000-grit very fine pad is applied dry to the floor with only a little water sprayed onto the tile using a process we call a spray burnish.

Being a kitchen there were a few deep stains in the floor which I was able to spot treat with Tile Doctor Reduxa which is an interesting product that is absorbed into the floor and then when heat is applied it evaporates lifting the stain out with it.

Terrazzo Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Reduxa Skyline Apartments Manchester

Sealing a Terrazzo Tiled Kitchen Floor

To seal the Terrazzo, I used two coats of Tile Doctor Colour Grow which as the name suggest is a colour enhancing sealer. The product works by soaking into the tile occupying the pores so dirt cannot become ingrained there. It added a lovely finish to the Terrazzo, enhancing its appearance and will make the floor much easier to keep clean going forward.

Terrazzo Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Skyline Apartments Manchester

The completed floor now looks clean and fresh and an amazing transformation considering how dirty the floor looked when I first arrived. My customer was very pleased with the improvement and left the following short comment on the Tile Doctor feedback system.

Kamila is the best!! great job.

Terrazzo Kitchen Floor After Cleaning Closeup Skyline Apartments Manchester

 

Restoring a Terrazzo Tiled Kitchen and Family room Floor in Manchester

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Travertine Floor West Disbury After

Travertine Tiled Floor Polished in West Didsbury

This job was a Travertine tiled Kitchen floor in West Disbury, the customer ask me to have a look at the tiles which had been down for three years and had quite a lot of cracks in, on top of that it had not been sealed very well when it had been laid which had allowed dirt to become ingrained into the tile leaving it looking dull.

Travertine-Floor-West-Disbury-Before Travertine-Floor-West-Disbury-Before

Maintaining Travertine Tiles

The first job was to wash the floor down to remove any grit from the floor and then remove what remained of the old sealer, now with Travertine being a very hard stone it has to be removed using of a set of diamond encrusted burnishing pads fitted to a rotary machine. Once this was done all the cracks in the Travertine were filled in using a flexible grout which was a blend of three different grout colours in order to get a shade that matched the colour of the travertine. The tiled area was quite confined and tricky to work in so this process including the sealer removal took two days in all.

Polishing and Sealing Travertine Tile

On the third day I used the fine burnishing pad to give the final polish and then to protect the floor from stains it was sealed with two coats of Tile Doctor Colour Grow which is a colour enhancing sealer that brings out the colours in natural stone. Once the sealer was dry it was buffed using a white buffing pad to make sure that I hadn’t left any residues from the seal.

Travertine-Floor-West-Disbury-After Travertine-Floor-West-Disbury-After

The customer was very pleased with the finish and found it very hard to spot the cracks I had filled.
 
 

Travertine tiled floor maintained in Greater Manchester

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Travertine Floor After

Travertine Tiled Kitchen Floor maintained in Manchester

This Travertine Tiled Floor was laid in an open plan Kitchen in West Didsbury, Manchester, hopefully you will be able to see from the photographs it was in need a regular clean and re-seal.

Dirty-Travertine-Befiore Dirty-Travertine-Before-photo

Cleaning and Polishing Travertine Tile

I gave the Travertine tiles a quick clean with a weak dilution of Tile Doctor Pro-Clean to remove any loose surface dirt and this was rinsed off with clean water before starting with a set of Burnishing pads. The Burnishing system we use has four different coloured pads and they fit to a rotary machine. You work your way through them together with a little water one by one until the floor is thoroughly cleaned and polished; we used the white buffing pad for this one.

Sealing Travertine Tile

When the Travertine tile was dry it was sealed with two coats of Tile Doctor Colour Grow which is a colour intensifying sealer that provides durable surface protection.

Travertine-Floor-After Travertine-Floor-After

 
 

Travertine Tiled Kitchen floor Cleaned, Polished and Sealed.

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Stockport Travertine Tiled Floor After

Travertine Tiled Kitchen Floor Maintained in Stockport

The owner of this modern bungalow in Stockport requested that we visit and rejuvenate the Travertine tiled floor installed in their kitchen. Stone floors do loose their appearance over time and so if you want to keep them looking good it makes sense to call us in every few years to give them a face lift.

Stockport-Travertine-Tiled-Floor-Before

Cleaning Travertine Tiles

For the best results hard stone tiles such as Travertine and Marble etc. need to be polished with a set of Burnishing pads however before you start that process it’s necessary to remove any surface dirt from the floor first, this will ensure any grit that could get trapped in the burnishing pads and scratch the floor is removed first. With this in mind we washed the floor using a mild dilution of Tile Doctor Pro-Clean, this was also a good opportunity to get a stiff brush into the grout lines and give them a good scrub. We washed the floor down with clean water using a wet vacuum to remove the water from the floor before moving onto the next step.

Polishing and Sealing Travertine Floor Tiles

We polished the floor using a set of 17” Burnishing pads fitted to our weighted polishing machine; the pads are diamond encrusted and you start with the coarser Red pad designed to remove sealers before moving on to the White, Yellow and finally Green polishing pad to achieve a high shine finish.

The last step was to seal the floor which we did using two coats of Tile Doctor Colour Grow which is colour intensifying sealer that will provide on-going durable surface protection as well as enhancing the natural colours in the Travertine tile.

Stockport-Travertine-Tiled-Floor-After

The kitchen wasn’t a large area and the Travertine dried quite quickly so we managed to clean, polish and seal the floor in the same day.
 
 

Cleaning Travertine Tiled Kitchen floor in Stockport

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Terracotta Kitchen Floor After

Terracotta Tiled Kitchen Floor Cleaned and Sealed in Horwich

This customer from the town of Horwich near Bolton had just had a new kitchen fitted and was considering ripping up the Terracotta tiled floor but thought they would contact Tile Doctor first to see if anything could be done. I went round to take a look and could see that the floor had lost its vitality and managed to convince the owner it was really just in need of a good deep clean and seal

Cleaning the Terracotta Tiled Floor

The Terracotta tiles still held some sealer so the first job was to remove that using a strong solution of Tile Doctor Pro-Clean which was worked into the floor using a buffing machine fitted with a black buffing pad. Once the floor was clean and I was happy the sealer was removed I rinsed the floor three times using clean water to neutralise the floor and remove any remaining cleaning product before sealing. I may have mentioned this before but I highly recommend the use of a wet vacuum at this stage as it makes the job of removing liquids from floors much faster.

Terracotta-Kitchen-Floor-Before Terracotta-Kitchen-Floor-Before

Sealing Terracotta Floor Tiles

The floor was left to dry overnight and I came back the next day to apply the sealer. For Terracotta floors I usually use Tile Doctor Seal and Go, its recommended for terracotta and as well as providing good stain protection adds a nice low sheen to the floor. Terracotta is very porous and as a result I had found it was necessary to apply seven coats of sealer before it had become fully sealed; this does take time as it’s necessary to allow each coat to dry before applying the next.

Terracotta-Kitchen-Floor-After Terracotta-Kitchen-Floor-After

I thought the floor looked transformed after the work we did, certainly my customer was very pleased with the work and left the following remark:

First class professional job that brought the terracotta floors up better than new
Mr. D. Hall, Horwich
 
 

Cleaning and Sealing Terracotta Floor Tiles in Horwich

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