Ivory BAL Grout dried patchy - Tile Advice

[cr0ft]

Hi all,

It's been a while since I posted here as work has been busy. I'm after some advice please. Finished a bathroom for a customer a couple of weeks back. Plaster walls (left to dry around 6 months, don't ask why!!). Shower area tanked with Durabase Waterproof matting. Tubbed Mapei D2 adhesive used for small format tiles in shower area. BAL Green star used for remainder of room. BAL Ivory grout used on to grout all. Bathroom left 24 hrs between completion of fixing tiles and grouting.

Grout mixed in a very well cleaned bucket with fresh water. Mixed with a mechanical mixer, left to sit for 3 minutes then mixed again (slowly both times). All of the bathroom was grouted with one mix of grout.

The grout has dried ivory coloured in some areas and patchy darker colours in other areas. It looks awful!

The BAL rep has come out and stated that it could be the Mapai adhesive reacting with the grout. Fine, except the Mapei adhesive was only used in the shower area and the whole room is the same. They are taking a sample of the grout for analysis. He also indicated that it was surface contamination only. I used a new sealed sponge to wash the grout down and a clean towel to polish off the tiles afterwards.

Has anyone else done everything properly before and come across this? I would be most interested to know!

Thanks!

 

[macten]

Over wetting during wash down or washing down to early.

OR

How big were the tiles?
Were you bedding out?

Not a fan of tubbed stuff.

 

[cr0ft]

Hi mate. Tiles were around 160x80mm fixed in a brick bond. No bedding out otherwise I would have used cement-based and primed the wall. I hear your point about washing down but I did it the same as all my other bathrooms and they've all been fine. If anything I probably waited longer than normal before washing down because grouting them took forever due to their size!

 

[Ian]

How long did you leave the grout to dry before buffing them? No chance it could be dry dust stuck to the damp grout?

 

[macten]

Almost always a water issue. Maybe tubbed stuff on tanking membrane takes a lot longer to dry.
Or maybe you left the joints wet after washing down - it's a lot cooler now and drying times get longer.
Try a bit of phosphoric acid with a white emulsifying pad (assuming tile isn't acid sensitive), do a test patch, wash off and see if it dries any better.

Next choice would be to go back in a few weeks and recolour with Fuga Fresca or similar.

 

[cr0ft]

Hi,

Not sure on the exact time but I left it till the grout was starting to dry on the surface of the tile basically. We've tried cleaning the grout and there's no sign of anything stuck to the surface itself. Weird one really.

 

[cr0ft]

Almost always a water issue. Maybe tubbed stuff on tanking membrane takes a lot longer to dry.
Or maybe you left the joints wet after washing down - it's a lot cooler now and drying times get longer.
Try a bit of phosphoric acid with a white emulsifying pad (assuming tile isn't acid sensitive), do a test patch, wash off and see if it dries any better.

Next choice would be to go back in a few weeks and recolour with Fuga Fresca or similar.

Hi and thanks. Never used Fuga Fresca, does it work a treat for patchy grout?

 

[Ian]

The colourants are very good, I've used universeal a few times now and it's a great product. Tradetiler sell it.

 

[DHTiling]

Hi...

This will probs be water dispersion from a none fully cured adhesive bed... this will leach moisture into the grout joints as it dries and expels moisture through the joints as it cannot disperse into the substrate.