travertine cleaning (you wish!)

The travertine tile on my bathroom floor has developed a film or haze on it. Does it need resealing, special cleaning, etc? It has lost its shine.

 

Dear Annamarie:

Your polished travertine never needed to be sealed to begin with. (It is actually impossible to seal it: its high surface tension will not allow any sealer for – a.k.a. as impregnator – in.)

And then, what a sealer for stone has got to do with the finish of your stone??...

Stone is polished mechanically, by abrasion and friction, not by slapping a sealer onto it.

You floor lost its shine simply because of regular foot traffic (or wrong cleaning agents) and you probably did nothing in terms of preserving the original factory finish.

What to do know?

Your only option is to hire a bona fide stone restoration contractor who will lightly grind (hone) and re-polish your stone.

Now, you'd better watch out! I consider stone refinishing as the very pinnacle of all the activities related to stone from a professional point of view. Unfortunately, there are a lot of quacks on the loose out there! You get one of those, and you may even have to kiss your stone bye-bye!

How could you tell a champ from a chomp? Could you trust the recommendation of your local stone distributor, or contractor, or your interior decorator? Hardly!

We have available a very comprehensive article on how to select a bona fide stone restoration contractor, which will give you all the intelligence you need to make a competent choice. It does carry a small price tag, and you can order it by logging on the Educational Literature section 0f our website at:   http://www.mbstone.com/literature/literature.htm. It's available in pay-per-download format and I consider it a cheap “insurance premium” to pay when there are thousands of $ involved! Not to mention the little and much needed support you'd be giving to the cause – YOUR cause, since every single penny of the cost of the article will be used to support it.

Also, will you please read and sign our Statement of Purpose at: http://www.marblecleaning.org/purpose.htm? By spreading the word about this valuable site among your friend & family and the stone trades' people you've been dealing with you will be rendering everybody a valuable service!   

Moreover, do take advantage of the plethora of FREE Helpful Hints available at:   http://www.mbstone.com/HH_promo/helpful_hints.htm. They're on the house!

Thank you.

Ciao and good luck,

Mauri z io Bertoli

 

www.marblecleaning.org – The Only Consumers' Portal to the Stone Industry Establishment!