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Our customer had just bought this beautiful victorian style house where they also had a lifeless and patchy but promising victorian tiled floor. House itself was located in fine location in Altrincham. Altrincham
is in the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford
in Greater Manchester
and lies within the historic County boundaries of Cheshire. The town has rather subsumed the neighbouring boroughs of Hale, Timperley, Broadheath, Hale Barns and Bowdon. Once a busy shopping / market town, Altrincham has reinvented itself as a eating and drinking venue based around the Old Market Hall which is now a thriving hub for families and revelers enjoying the wide range of food and drink available.
It's also known for many of it's victorian buildings like our customer had just bought.
On arrival we explained our victorian floor tiles restoring methodsand did a small cleaning tester for them. Our client liked what they saw and decided to go ahead.
Due to completing the cleaning tester we already know what products to use for this floor. For removing the patchy and worn old sealer with some paint spots we used a strong mix of our regular high-alkaline Cleaner and sealer stripper. Strong mix of the alkaline cleaner got sprayed on tiles and got left to dwell in for about 10 - 15 minutes. When sealer was softened by the stripper, we scrubbed with with strong scrubbing pad fitted to rotary machine.
After scrubbing all soiled chemical water got removed with wet vacuum and then rinsed with clean water. On this floor we were lucky the old sealer was worn and one application was enough to remove all of the old sealer.
Although we managed to remove old sealer with our strong alkaline cleaner/stripper, there was still ingrained dirt which needed cleaning. For ingrained dirt cleaning we used 200 grit diamond burnishing pads. Burnishing pad got fitted to buffing machine and we used some water as a lubricant, this way no dust will be created as dirt and clay dust will mix with water which again got removed with wet vax.
Of course rotary machine won't get everywhere so we had to use our hand burnishing block to go over edges, corners and lowered tiles, after what all floor got rinsed with clean water.
Finally when all victorian tiles were properly cleaned we did a quick wash over the floor with acidic cleaner and then rinsed the floor thoroughly with water, after what the floor got left to dry for two days.
On return first thing we did was checking dampness in tiles with our damp tester. It had been a nice weather but still after two days of drying we found few damp areas that needed drying with our heatguns.
Damp removed we started sealing. For sealing we used our 2 sealer system - first sealing with impregnating sealer and then with topical sealer. This system seals the floor inside out and leaves a much more enhances look then any of the sealers alone.
Find out more about sealing here: https://www.qualitytilecare.co.uk/importance-of-sealing-tiles-stone-and-grout
First we sealed with colour enhancing impregnating sealer, we added 2 coats as this floor was really drinking it. After each coat we polished off any sealer excess from tiles with soft cotton cloths. Sealing finished with impregnating sealer we had to give it couple hours drying time, meaning we got a longer lunch this time around.
Next up we sealed the floor with our topical sealer which is water basedblend of acrylic polymers that provides both a stain resistant surface seal and a durable low-sheen finish. Topical sealer got applied on with paint pad and floor took three coats in total with half an hour drying time between coats.
Our customer was very happy with the work completed and even took our personalised yearly maintenance plan to keep this now beautiful floor in pristine condition for years to come.
Before leaving we also gave them all the maintenance info needed before our return.
Tags: Impregnating Sealer , Ingrained Dirt , Victorian Tiles , Hallway , Tile Cleaning , Burnishing , Altrincham , Manchester , Cheshire , Trafford , Maintenance plan , Topical Sealer , Victorian House , Altrincham Tile Cleaning , Victorian Hallway Cleaning , Victorian Floor Treatment , Altrincham Tile Floor Cleaning