Grouting gone wrong

Tilers Forums Official Sponsors

B

bulboy

Hi, first time post and first time tiling in my home.
I got a house and doing the work myself. The floors turned out great using the ardex system (tiling over bitumen residue - but of this at the end).

Started the kitchen splashback - standard galley kitchen. one side is a plain rectangle between worktop and wall cabinets.
Wall was slightly off the straight so compensated by up to 5 mm.
Surface primed and used unibond ready wall addy.
Tiles are ceramic 100 mm square beige colour to my wife. very light brown to me.
Tiling went fine, used Bal white grout - same as in bathroom.
grouted, then wiped with sponge and left for the night.

in the morning my dad decided to clean the haze and used paper towels. in the process the grout got dirty marks.
I tried to wash them to no avail. tried scraping the dirt off with nail again some of it will come off. Then got angry and used a steel grout remover tool.
Then this made me furious - the metal marks on the side of the tiles in the joint. I tried on a loose tile and the mark disappears when I rub it with my finger but can not put my finger in the joint.

_____________] [_________

Any advice how to remove? WD-40 on a ear bud? Bit of cloth? If I use WD-40 do I need to clean the area and with what?



Going back to my flooring.
I have inherited concrete slab without DPM, screed, bitumen cutback adhesive and thermoplastic tiles. Carpet on top of it all.
As the tiles contain asbestos that had to go. THey are not notifiable if appropriate procedure is followed as described in the documents on the HSE website.
Tiles came off easily and that left the bitumen to deal with.
On most of the forums the general advise is elbow grease and the big mutt. But then the glue may have asbestos in it too.
the other solutions were (I am not related or hold interest in any of the following products or companies. It was a choice of me reviewing the information available):
- slurry coat - many claim it works but no guarantee given
- BAL Green bag - that one required 70% of the residue to be removed.

Finally spoken to Ardex after reviewing information on ARDITEX NA.
Their suggestion was as follows:
- ARditex NA self level
- Ardex DPM 1C - liquid DPM
- Ardex P4 primer - thats white latex like emulsion which is rolled and contains some grit in it.
- Ardex X7R - adhesive
- Ardex Flex FL - Grout - got that in brown

The best price-availability local to me I found from DMS flooring in Bedford and Apex Grange in Welwyn. Credit due where its due.

Floors came very good having in mind first time experience. Knocked the tiles after couple of days and no hollow sound.
But the best thing was the smell was gone. There was a distinctive smell of old stuff I believe was from the bitumen adhesive. After putting the self level and the DPM that's completly gone.
 
get some 1200 wet dry sand paper fold until fits snugly between joints then gently rub up and down using a little water until marks disapear the grout dark patches might not be your dads fault if you grout to soon and the adhesive has not complety dried in patches where you have beded tiles then when the grout dries it will dark patches you must scape these back leave them for a day or two then regrout them hope this helps
 
Thank you for your reply. Will try the sanding. I was buttering the tiles as opposed to having addy on the wall and was carwfull to clean the joints. Again it may be the case
 

Advertisement

Weekly Email Digest

Back
Top

Click Here to Register for Free / Remove Ad