Marble Mosaic Tile Problem in Shower Stall

My contractor installed the Carrera marble basketweave tile I selected on my bathroom and shower stall floors and sealed both twice with Miracle 511 Porous Plus as recommended by tile supplier. In the shower stall, the tiles around 2 edges almost immediately became "permanently" dark (they do not dry/become light after 48 hours). It is now one month and the area that is dark is enlarging and spreading towards the center. The shower bed was not adequately pitched upwards towards the walls. Is this the only problem? If the floor is demolished and the cement is repoured in the pan w/ adequate pitch, will the marble tiles stay light? (I live in a cement slab construction apartment building.) Thank you! Linda

 

Dear Linda:

 

“ sealed both twice with Miracle 511 Porous Plus as recommended by tile supplier ”

 

No, he did not seal your stone for nothing. To make sure, he did apply a totally useless (under the circumstances) impregnator to your tiles – and twice to boot – but that doesn't mean that he actually sealed them. White Carrara is too dense to take any sealer in. (Yeah, I know, the dealer told you that marble is soooo very porous and all that nonsense...) So, the only thing he did is to charge you for something that you needed like a hole in your head.

As a clear evidence of his professional knowledge, is the total installation failure that you're reporting.

Get another installer in the picture, have them replace your floor and then forget about the sealing thing.

Now remember, it's never too early to think about the proper maintenance of your stone. The issue of what you'll be doing day in and day out to your stone is – as it should be intuitive – vastly more important than its sealing (if and when possible and/or advisable) and it's all too often neglected. As you can tell by reading many of this site's postings, you're not likely to get good information about routine care from your dealer or installer. Don't become another statistic! By logging into the Helpful Hints section of our website at:   http://www.mbstone.com/HH_promo/helpful_hints.htm , you will be able to get the short version of our maintenance guidelines at no charge. The full version of it – a 7-page document considered by many as an industry benchmark – is available in pay-per-download format in our Educational Literature section at:   http://www.mbstone.com/literature/literature.htm .  

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Ciao and good luck,

Mauri z io Bertoli

 

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