Cleaning rough granite(?) floor

We have a natural stone floor in our new home - VERY natural. The stone is rough, irregular, unpolished, & looks straight out of a medieval castle. The fireplace is surrounded by the same rough stone, but it is shiny & the color variations in the stone are distinct. The floor is dull & dirty. Any suggestions on the best way to clean it? The stone is dark gray & looks like granite to my untrained eye (like boulders in the Appalachians.) I'm not sure if the floor was ever sealed. Thanks!

 

Dear Janette:

 

“ I'm not sure if the floor was ever sealed. ”

 

I doubt it!... J

 

Well, it sounds to me like you've got some heavy-duty cleaning to do! I won't even venture guessing what kind of stone you have, but it really doesn't matter.

Let's start with the cleaning: unless you want to hire a professional janitor to do it for you, you will have to rent a professional-grade floor machine with a scrubbing brush. You can find one at any janitorial supply company. (Do practice with the machine at the place where you rent it: it's easy to use, but if you don't learn how to balance it, it will drive you, not vice-versa!) You will also need a wet and dry vacuum cleaner, but you can buy a good inexpensive one at a Big Box store and it will always come in handy in a house.

Fill a large bucket with hot water and the highest recommended percentage of a heavy-duty alkaline cleaner rated for stone like MB-2. Apply it liberally with a mop to a section of the floor approximately 50 to 100 sq. ft. I do mean liberally: you have to create a layer of water and cleaner on the floor! Let it dwell for a good 7 to 10 minutes feeding some more solution if you notice that it dries in certain spots. After that, go over that area with the floor scrubber and scrub the heck out of that floor! Pick up the dirty water with the wet and dry vac and rinse one first time with clean water. Do another section, and so on until you finish the job. Rinse one more time the entire floor with clean water and then try to dry the floor at your best with the vacuum. Let it dry and check if it needs to be done one more time or if it clean already.

Once the heavy-duty cleaning is finished, you will mop your floor with water and a good regular cleaning floor detergent rated for natural stone like MB-1, which will remove all the streaks left behind from the water. In fact, you won't have to rinse that one: just let it dry by itself.

Now, if you like the way water brings out the color from your stone (make reference to the intensity of the colors only – not the sheen) you could consider applying a good-quality stone color enhancer/impregnator like MB-6, which will seal the floor while giving you in a permanent way the “wet-look”. (Once again, only the depth of color, not the sheen.) You may have to apply it twice for best results.

Have fun!

 

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Ciao and good luck,

Mauri z io Bertoli

 

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