Problem with yellowing grout

[Bathfix Bob]

Hi all, I did a bathroom about 10 months ago with white gloss wall tiles and Webber anti mould grout, the grout has now gone a dirty yellow colour on all four walls, even over the door which is nowhere near the shower.

The walls were all either new plasterboard or solid plaster.

This is so dissapointing as its ruined the bathroom for my customer, I used white webber powdered adhesive and left it days before grouting, the water used was clean etc.

I never had this problem before, she dosn't have a fan in the bathroom but this dosn't appear to be mildew issue, just uniform yellowing. :mad2:

Any ideas??

 

[Time's Ran Out]

Are they smokers and do they polish the 'wet' walls with a yellow duster?
May sound daft questions but I've seen it before!

Other than that - :mad2:

 

[Bathfix Bob]

No she dosn't smoke, I don't thiink she's done anything to the walls, do you think I should contact Webber?

Totally gutted about this, raking out and redoing will be a massive job, espesially with the mossaic border.

 

[Deleted member 9966]

hi Bob

have you raked any grout out in an inconspicuous area yet? might be worth ascertaining if the yellowing is just on the surface or whether it runs through the depth of the grout in the joint. if it runs through the depth, it might be a faulty batch and you should contact Webber for their advice, but if it's just on the surface, then the grout has reacted to something in the room - air, air fresheners, cleaning products, cleaning utensils like John suggested...

have you asked the customer how she cleans her bathroom walls and what with?

certain shower gels and shampoos have been known to react badly with grout and turn it an orange colour, so you'll be best starting to eliminate anything that could be reacting with the grout on a daily/weekly/monthly basis.

 

[Stewart]

It could be leeching from the tile biscuit, what were the tiles made of?

 

[Bathfix Bob]

Thanks for the replys, the tiles are ceramic, I think she got them from Wickes.

 

[kilty55]

check if she is cleaning the tiles with bleach or bleach based products

 

[troweler]

This is interesting,we have been tiling hotel bathrooms and 2 weeks ago we were called back to a hotel where we had tiled 16 bathrooms, 4 of which had the exact same problem.We used Bal grout.I rang their technical dept but they couldnt offer a logical explanation.It was a nightmare,it wasnt all the walls just patches but still needed regrouting.My feeling is its not a problem with the grout but im not sure what it is.Anyway the problem is identical.

 

[White Room]

Is it something bleeding from the back ground, wall areas

 

[DHTiling]

I was just going to ask about bleach but Jamie has got that one in there.. so we await your answer..

 

[DHTiling]

Bleach can burn grout and send it yellow.

 

[BWTiling]

Personally I'd say rake out the Grout and check the Substrate in a small area! Seen it loads of times and timeframe for it happening is always a lot quicker for Bathrooms with Poor Ventilation!! You'll probably find that because no adhesives / grouts are totally impervious to Water the condensation in the room alone will make the Substrate damp and because it's the background takes a lot longer to dry out (ventilation again!). If it's a Yellow colour then it's normally Plasterboard, a darker Yellow / Orange / Brown type colour is normally Solid Plaster Skim. Anti-Mould etc. will make no difference as to the colour of the Grout "Bleaching" due to the condition of the substrate!
Good Luck and let us know how you get on?

 

[Bathfix Bob]

I've just spoken to Webber technical and he said it's something that does happen now and then, he said it could be certain types of shampoo, poor ventilation etc.

This is the problem with tiling, there's so manys things that can come back and bite you in the behind later on.

Why didn't the existing grout go yellow? who knows....

 

[Dan]

Are they coming out to check it out?

 

[FreeD]

Hi there. If the grout is in good condition maybe you could colour seal the grout with aquamix. I've had good results with that in the past, saves raking it all out.