Charcoal Limestone Bad Experience!

[jay]

think its best to remove and start again might be a good chance to change tilers to

 

[DHTiling]

Try the cleaner first,, you can also use a good enhancer to deepen the colour and lessen the whiteness but lets clean it first but i do think that the acid has knacked the surface.. very few cleaners are suitable for limestone..

Please do report back.. it is cheaper to try a couple things before either honing them or replacing..

 

[jc02]

Spent weekend scrubbing. Use HG Spot Stain Remover and then HG Remover as recommended by HG helpline. White marks still there despite repeated attempts. If anything, looks worse now that the sealer is off. Won't post any pics as it is too depressing and I think they would make the top ten of tile disasters and you'll all tell me and I'll feel worse!

Although I think further scrubbing would give some minor improvement and colour enhancing stain would darken and hide a bit, it looks very unlikely that the end result would be anything that anyone would want. Realistically, I think I am onto honing or re-tiling. So it is really a cost comparison exercise. My questions:
1. When tiles and adhesive are lifted, does the subsurface (self-levelling compund in this case) usually need renewal/repair?
2. What are the pros and cons of grinding an existing floor?
3. If within the rules of this forum, if anyone is within reach of Cardiff and wants to quote or give an indicative cost for grinding (or replacing) a 31sqm area, would be happy to receive PMs. I need an idea of comparative costs so I can choose a course of action.
Thanks you all for your help so far. Invaluable.

 

[Onlinetiler]

Not so much a recommendation as a maybe jc, but might be worth trying some slate oil. Haven't used it on Limestone before and to be honest not sure if it'll work, but it's a sealer that's got a slight brownish colour to it so I wondered whether it might deal with the white patches. Maybe a bit unorthodox but for a few quid may be worth a patch test.