Disaster! Grout stained porcelain tiles - tiles weren't sealed

[Meek]

Hi,

we laid some ESL ceramics Molise beige tiles in the kitchen and used Granfix Maxigrout in brown colour (not my choice) and the grout has stained the tiles badly. My builder/jack of all trades didn't follow the instructions to do a test on a spare tile and dived straight in and.. oh dear I feel sick.

We've been scrubbing the tiles for HOURS with grout remover (wickes) and it's not making a difference. The tiles look awful. Any advice on what to do to rectify this or is it hopeless?
Thanks

 

[Ceramico tiling]

Aquamix nanoscrub is an abrasive cleaner that might do the trick.

 

[faithhealer]

hello meek, sorry to hear, could you register and put a picture up, thanks

 

[Yorkshire Tiling Services]

broken link removed

This will do the trick, follow instructions for dilution & washing off.
Ensure you wear rubber gloves and eye protection. Very strong, will burn skin.
Ensure adequate ventilation.

 

[DHTiling]

Hi Meek..

Are these polished porcelain or matt through bodied. .?

 

[Meek]

Hi, thanks for your replies everyone. I've managed to get a photo from my mobile so apologies for the quality. I'll try using the ltp cleaner if I can get it, we've got a Tile Giant locally so should be able to get it from there if it's open tomorrow.

The tiles are matt porcelain but they have small holes in them which hindsight tells me I should have insisted on having sealed.

Anyway, what do you guys think, is it bad?

 

[DHTiling]

oooo!!..

what grout was it.. that is damp picture framing stains..

 

[Meek]

Granfix Maxi Grout

Hygienic Maxigrout

Is picture framing something to do with efflorescence?

edit. I forgot to mention, the tiles had plastic on them which was left on when grouting then it was peeled off. (don't ask, I wasn't there - but I think the plastic was to protect the tiles !)

 

[DHTiling]

It isn't efflorescence.

By looking at the pics it is picture framing stains.. how long since it was grouted..?

 

[Meek]

It was grouted yesterday morning.

 

[DHTiling]

and is the plastic film removed..?

 

[Meek]

Yep, plastic was removed after grouting.

 

[DHTiling]

OK..

what i will suggest is leave it till monday and see if the damp framing subsides, if not then please do come back..

It could just be moisture within the tile edges that has not dispersed yet.

 

[DHTiling]

Just another thought as well..

How soon after tiling did he grout..?

 

[Meek]

It was around a week and a half. He laid the tiles with cement rather than adhesive as the floor was uneven and it's quite a large area. Is there any way to tell the difference between damp staining and dye-staining?

 

[faithhealer]

It was around a week and a half. He laid the tiles with cement rather than adhesive as the floor was uneven and it's quite a large area. Is there any way to tell the difference between damp staining and dye-staining?

get a pencil and draw around one of the stain marks, check in the morning to see if its receeded any

 

[Meek]

Ok, I'm going to give that a try. Thank you very much for your advice Dave and faithhealer.

 

[Spud]

hi meek, sorry to see your floor so badly stained ,molise is a tile I am quite familar with and there is a branch of esl where I live ,when we work with molise we remove all the plastic film before tiling and clean any glue residue off of them ,the molise tile has the holes in it to make it look like travertine ,they have several colours matt and polished finish ,we normally use lithofin fz stainstop before laying and remove any excess sealer that is still on the tile after 20mins with a clean cloth,I think the brown colour grout was a mistake for this colour tile unless you were going to over grout the whole surface and fill all the holes up,I am unsure of how to remove the dye from your tiles but if it was me I would try a rotary floor polishing machine and an abrasive cleaner such as nanoscrub or lithofin abra-clean ,to see if its worth pursuing this method get some cif and a scotchbrite pad and do a test area to see if it does any good,good luck,
Esl are pretty helpful ring Tony at stevenage 01438 729900
pictures of molise polished with ivory grout

 

[Onlinetiler]

Hi Meek,

The link Yorkshire left further up could be the perfect stuff for the job, I've had to use it on a similar scenario before to clean up a botched grouting job (hasten to add not mine, just called in to rectify) - charcoal grout on a white polished porcelain and it took a couple of go's but did the job.

 

[starmsy]

T cut belive it or not works a treat!