You install natural stone in your floorings, countertops, shower areas, walls and around swimming pools. Moreover, to get dry bathroom spaces, you install glass doors in your showers. Glass is also used for shelves, cupboards and for making some divisions in your furniture. Stone and glass together add elegance and beauty to your homes and commercial complexes. But natural stone and glass have to be cleaned well with the help of a professional restoration service if you want to maintain the sheen and luster for long.
Natural stone is highly porous and tends to get stained very quickly. It also chips and cracks due to heavy impact. Glass, on the other hand, gets dirty and stained because of hard water droplets, soap scum accumulation and etching. To keep your surfaces intact, beautiful and maintained, you should hire the help of a professional restoration service.
Common Problems with Natural Stone:
- Natural stone such as slate, travertine, marble and granite are the common choices but these stones are also highly porous. The porosity factor enables water to penetrate deep within leading to unhygienic conditions. Any food or liquid spills on the surface penetrates deep within the stone leading to mold and mildew formation.
- Another issue with these stones is that they chip off due to heavy impact.
- Some natural stones also shed dust. This not only keeps your interiors full of dust but the stone also loses its sheen and brilliance after a few years.
- Grout is a dense liquid made from cement and sand used in the gaps between two tiles.
- It is porous and tends to absorb all kinds of liquids inside its pores. Mold and mildew love to breed in damp places. The dampness inside its pores lead to mold and mildew breeding, which deteriorate the look of your grout with their greenish black residue. Mold also causes health hazards.
- Grout often cracks and goes missing in some places. This wear and tear comes due to heavy impact of furniture, extreme weather conditions and rough use. The missing gaps get water stagnant in their crevices, again leading to mold breeding.
Common Problems on Glass Surfaces:
- Calcium and magnesium minerals present in hard water leave a whitish mark once the water evaporates. These hard water stains make the glass dirty.
- Shower glass gets dirty by soap scum, which is nothing but a mix of hard water and soap. Soap scum reduces the aesthetic beauty of your surfaces.
- Acidic cleaners etch glass surfaces. Etched glass surfaces are porous and they allow hard water minerals to seep into their pores over time, leading to corrosion.
- The areas where the shower glass meets the door frame or wall tile is always damp and attracts mold and mildew breeding.
To prevent these issues and to preserve your natural stone, grout and glass surfaces right from the start, it is essential that it is maintained properly. A little knowledge about the necessary procedures can help you hire the best professional service and stay away from low-quality service providers.
What to Expect from a Professional Restoration Service?
Eliminating Stains, Oily Residue, Mold and Dirt from Natural Stone Surfaces:
Natural stone is porous and tends to absorb liquids and food spills leading to deep-rooted mold formation and tough staining. A good cleaner should have the capability of knocking off these stains at the root level.
Removing Mold and Dirt from Pool, Countertop, Flooring and Shower Grout:
A commercial and a home tile and grout cleaning service includes sanitization of tile and grout together. When the experts use a heavy-duty cleaner to clean your natural stone, they should also clean the grout lines using a grout brush to ensure that no stains, mold or debris remain in the thin lines or in the corners. Your pool grout, shower tile grout or countertop grout need to be hygienic and clean.
Knocking Off Hard Water Stains and Soap Scum From Glass Doors and Shelves:
Your glass surfaces deserve the best product on the market. You can ask your restoration service provider to clean the soap scum, etching marks or hard water stains from your shower doors and glass shelves to make them look clean and beautiful.
Next, you should check the surface for cracks and chips. Powerful adhesives are best for cracked grout repair, which give a seamless repair result without appearing too bulky. Ensure that the professionals use an adhesive that won’t pop off from the surface and also that can be pigmented in colors matching your tile and grout. If you are also looking for re-caulking service, then you can discuss this issue with your service provider.
If they suggest using epoxy resin adhesives to seal your shower corners instead of re-caulking, then you should know that they are quite knowledgeable and that you have chosen the right contractor. Such sealants are the trending demand products today which have completely abolished the old practice of caulking. These products provide long lasting results. Sentura is an example of one such product.
Repairing Damaged or Missing Grout:
Just like natural stone, one can repair grout too to seal the cracks, missing spaces and gaps. Expect your restoration service provider to use the same epoxy resin adhesives to repair your grout too. Do not encourage re-grouting service as it is very temporary. Re-grouting is nothing but the application of another layer of grout on the existing damaged grout. This procedure results in cracks again.
Sealing Grout and Stone Surface to Prevent Water Seepage:
Home and commercial cleaning and sealing services also include sealing your grout and natural stone after cleaning to prevent further dirt accumulation. Epoxy resin grout sealers seal the grout to form a preventive water-proof barrier on it. They preserve it for long.
You get colored grout sealing services too so that you can match your grout to the color of your choice. After repairing the cracks in stone, sealing the stone surface with natural look sealers help to create a protective barrier on the stone, thereby preventing further moisture absorption.
You have to check that your contractor does not use a low quality sealer, which will peel off within months, or that which gives a very bulky appearance. Sealing the surface not only protects it from further staining and mold breeding but also restores the lost sheen.
Glass Sealing to Prevent Further Stain Formation:
Residential and commercial glass sealing and cleaning services include cleaning the glass first and then sealing the surface to prevent further stain formation. You can expect your restoration service provider to use a glass sealant on your clean and dry surface to form a protective and preventive barrier that does not let water stains or soap scum formation.
Polishing Stone to Restore your Surfaces like New:
You can also ask your contractors for polishing stone, if you want your surface to be restored just like new. Polishing natural stone with clear topical based sealers imparts a brilliant sheen and lustre. This is equal to what your stone had when it was newly installed. For polishing, experts use natural look sealers that coat the sealer and the stone at the same time.
Maintaining Stone and Glass Surfaces:
You can ask your restoration service provider to guide you with the best quality stone and glass maintenance products too, so that you can maintain your surfaces and clean the superficial dirt. A knowledgeable contractor will guide you towards the best products in the market. This will help you maintain your surfaces like new for long.
In case, you are not able to find a good contractor, we have a few suggestions for you. You can try the services of D’Sapone – a professional hard surfaces restoration service provider for all your cleaning, sealing and maintaining jobs. If you plan to try the restoration yourself, then pFOkUS® – restoration products manufacturing company in the US, has a very wide range of options