POSTED: July 2, 2009 by velocci
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OK
ya i have smooth porcelon tiles on the main floor aswell. how long did it take your husband to do all that?
just make sure you get all the excess off your tiles before it dries. We didn't on some of our tiles and it looks like a dried water mark when you look at the tile from a certain angle in the right light. No one else can probably see the spots but I know where they are and it really bugs me. We were told the only way to remove the marks was for a professional to "lightly, very lightly, sand" the tile. Ours are smooth procelain tiles. Also my husband tried the little wheel but preferred using a fine bristle paint brush instead. Very time consuming - our hallway and kitchen area was 30' long and 5' & 12' wide.
I did mine, almost5 years ago in my last house. Think it was wipe on, though. We also had a matching cleaner, that had a little of the sealing stuff in it, too. You couldn't see it on the unglazed tiles on the floor, but as soon as they were wet, the water just beaded right off.
Yes, you still need to seal grout or water etc. can seep through and you can also end up with your grout stained or wearing away from cleaning products. There are various sealers where they sell tile and you gauge by the type of tile used (glazed or not). I have some I bought for my new tiles in my bathroom (floor and shower) and it comes in a litre sized bottle for about $16. You can apply with a brush or applicator (it's a bottle with a wheel on it that costs about $5) or cloth. YOu apply it directly to very dry grout (I was told to leave my grout alone for at least 7 - 10 days to completely dry, so no showers during that time). Apply and wipe up excess, then apply another coat, wipe up excess, and keep doing that until you can see the finish of the grout is no longer rough and is fully sealed. You can use the sealer periodically to reseal any that comes off from cleaning (and watch because some of the big mold killing cleaners will eat the sealer right off).
Here is a link to the stuff on the HD site. The sealer I bought is made by the same company (and sold at HD) but comes in a yellow bottle and you can get smaller sized containers than the one shown on this link.
[url]http://www.homedepot.ca/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CatalogSearchResultView?storeId=10051&catalogId=10051&langId=-15&N=0&Ntk=level1&Ntt=grout%20sealer&Nty=1&D=grout%20sealer&Ntx=mode+matchallpartial&Dx=mode+matchallpartial&s=true[/url]