Travertine with a bunch of wax on it

[Ron Lippold]

Give me the low down no one wants this job. 2200 sq ft of gold travertine looks like good stone, not alot of fill holes, warned them about pitting. There is a bunch of was on this floor, I striped a small area and the stone is real dull. They would like it shinny.

what you you guys do short of dimond polish

 

[boazcan]

Take all the wax off and use those twister pads. Should work real nice.

I still cannot get the twister guy out here to demo them for me, but I am thinking it should work out ok.


Bryan

 

[J Scott W]

Some topical finishes can be hard to remove. It was a good idea to strip a small section before you agreed to the entire job.

There are honing / polishing / shing powders of various grits that can be used under a pad on a rotary machine. Stone Tech is one line. There are others.

This is definitley less than diamond grinding, but can give a shine to a dull floor or bring the shine on a neglected fllor to a higher level.

Scott Warrington

 

[TimP]

I'd have to agree with Scott. Unless you're willing to polish the floor I'd think it would be one that you'd want to skip over. Especially if they weren't happy with the cleaning results. You may want to find someone who does this work in your area and see if you can get a finders fee out of it or at least some sort of networking out of it. I myself would be fairly hesitant about doing it unless they didn't care if they were a guinea pig.

 

[Fon Johnson]

Depending on what is on it, you might have a nightmare ahead.. I don't get a lot of Travertine here.. Maybe David can chime in.

 

[Pmatte]

If its "dull" underneath that sounds like the honed finish.While we have never stripped travertine,(we prefer to grind and bring back level of sheen the client wants) I guess you can strip.

Whoever put wax on a travertine is even more stupid than I look.A topical coating will not allow the stone to breath.

I'd do this:start at 120,220 and that should get you the honed finish that came with the install,if they want "shinier",move up in your grits.

Patrick

 

[Larry Cobb]

Ron;

If the travertine is a honed finish, you should be able to:

1. Strip the wax & rinse

2. Powder polish the stone with a weighted floor machine.

3. Squeegee/Rinse the remaining polishing slurry off the stone.

The new powder polishes will do a very good job, without a lot of labor-intensive steps.

Larry

 

[alazo1]

I'd probably bid the wax removal only. Then see what it would take to get it to how they want it. Polish a few test areas so they can see results. Do they know that shinny = more maintenance? Do they have kids and dogs dropping crap everywhere?.

Polishing is only going to remove minute hairline scratches. Anything other then that and you would be able to see it 10x more then you can now. Maybe they put the wax on because the floor was looking like crap (scratches, etching).Pitting and holes also look pretty bad with a high polish to the point where they should be filled. Honning powders come in grits up to 800 which would give a pretty decent shine and hide the deeper scratches a little better. It depends how much their budget is. Full travertine restoration can run up to $10.00 sft. Wax removal seperate.

Albert