









This customer in Heaton Moor
, Manchester
contacted us about these Antique Shaped Quarry Tiles
as they were thinking of ripping the tiles up and replacing them. Heaton Moor is a suburb of Stockport
, Greater Manchester, England. It is one of the Four Heatons and borders Heaton Chapel, Heaton Norris and Heaton Mersey. Although they loved the floor tiles but for ten years they couldn't get them clean. When they moved into house, then these quarry tiles were covered with thick black coloured wax. Then they hired someone to strip the wax but not all of the wax wasn't cleaned off as tiles and grout was still left full of wax. They had to live 10 years not knowing how these beautiful Antique Shaped Quarry Tiles could look like.
When we did the tester we knew it was going to be complicated job for us but we wanted to help the customer.
For Cleaning and Stripping the wax off the quarry tiled floor we used our coatings stripper which we left to dwell in for about 10-15 minutes. We then scrubbed the quarry tiled floor with our black scrubbing pad fitted to rotary machine which was followed up by removing the soiled water with wet vacuum.
Unfortunately this didn't remove all the wax and we had to get on our hands and knees to use our steamers. Steaming mixed with the coatings remover and hard scrubbing did the job. Although it's a big health hazard if you use chemicals and steamer, so we had to use our masks to prevent the chemical steam getting into our lungs.
It took us three of days to clean these quarry tiles and grout because we could only do small bits at the time. Big problem for us was the shape of the tiles as it made the grout cleaning a nightmare job. When we finished with cleaning and stripping we went over the floor again rinsing the floor and softly buffing with soft white pad fitted to rotary machine. We then left the floor to dry till the next day.
For sealing the tiled floor we used our Colour Enhancing Impregnating Sealer, which penetrates in the surface and leaves a natural matt finish. These antique shaped quarry tiles and grout took 3 generous coats of the sealer. Each coat was left to soak in the tiles for about 15 - 20 minutes and then the residue got polished off with soft cotton cloths.
When customer saw the result she couldn't believe her eyes. We got told that she would have never imagined this quarry tile floor can look so good, she also mentioned that it doesn't look like her floor anymore, it looks like a holiday home. Of course we were very chuffed about these comments.
She also left us a feedback:
It was a pleasure to have Tony carrying out the work for us; he was very friendly and polite. With great effort and professionalism he has brought our quarry tiles back to life.
Here's some reading about importance of sealing your tile floor: https://www.qualitytilecare.co.uk/importance-of-sealing-tiles-stone-and-grout