HG natural stone protector

When I moved in with my husband the floor was in quite a state, I don’t think it had been sealed for many years & definitely never while he had owned the house (it was completely matte in 90% of areas) and no amount of cleaning made it look clean (1st photo was taken before I lived here, when husband had put the house up for sale). I did a lot of research into companies who would come & sort it out professionally & because the kitchen is so big I was looking at a minimum £800. In a dream world I’d have it ripped up & replaced with something nice (I really don’t like slate floors if I’m honest) but that was an insane cost. In the meantime I’ve scrubbed & mopped used every cleaning product known to man & I got it looking a lot cleaner, even the grout which I had thought was dark grey turned out to be off white, however where the slate was essentially ‘raw’ it was never really clean - I could mop repeatedly & the water never really ran clear. Parts of it would crumble & break off where it wasn’t treated too, it always looked dusty the minute it was dry. This year I purchased a cream rug for the living room & it kept getting filthy & I couldn’t understand why - until I realised walking through the kitchen, even if just cleaned that day, was bringing dust & traces of dirt which were getting trodden into the rug. So with rug rolled up & in the loft for now I decided to tackle the floor on my own, I don’t have the money for a professional. I bought the pre-cleaning stuff first & to be honest the floor was already clean from repeated scrubbing but i felt it helped to ensure there was nothing left at all, I didn’t want to put a gloss coat over dirt after all & I’m glad I didn’t skip this step. I’ve done 2 very thin coats & plan to do another 2 over the course of the weekend. I have pitted slate & smooth slate so I’ve used a paintbrush, a roller, then smoothed it over with a micro fibre cloth and already after 2 coats I think it’s improved a lot. The big advantage will be if anything gets dropped it won’t stain - on the raw slate everything stained, I can tell already how much less time I will need to spend on keeping this awful floor clean. I might even grow to like the floor as it gets more shiny. I would say don’t rush it, I did the right side first to be able to use the left side & then did the second coat in one go before I went to bed, and I’m doing the 3rd & 4th coats across two days. I was a bit heavier handed on the right side with the 1st coat which you can tell, so will have to be careful on the 3rd & 4th coats to try & blend this in, I’m sure that will be fairly easy.

I have a hand made clay tile floor in my cottage kitchen. They are Mexican "Saltillo" tiles which were installed around 20 years ago. As part of the kitchen re-vamp I decided it was time to show the floor a bit of TLC. The tiles were dirty, grimy and had an occasional paw print where a cat had walked on a fresh painted surface. I first cleaned the floor with the HG Extreme Power Cleaner ( https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B002QGQOS8/ ) which worked wonders. When the floor was dry from the cleaning I used a spray bottle with the Protective Coating diluted 1:1 with clean water. I sprayed over the floor and then used a microfibre mop to evenly spread the coating over the tiles ( I used this and it worked a treat - https://www.amazon.co.uk/Professional-Microfiber-Stainless-Included-Scrubber/dp/B01E40877Y ). In the 20 years the floor has been down I have used various methods to apply polish from a brush, a small paint roller, a microfibre towel, a sponge and this is the fastest method I have yet used, and it gave a very even coat too. Due to the amount of neglect the floor had received I built up several layers of gloss polish. The polished dried after about an hour and I could then re-coat. After several coats I then left it for a few days to cure, and then applied several more coats. Left these to cure over a couple of days. I'm now probably on 12 to 15 thin coats of this tile polish and the floor looks as it did 20 years ago. It has been hard work, and i@m aching all over from the scrubbing, but the end result has certainly got me a few Brownie Points in the bank to be used when lockdown finishes. Would I buy this product again? Yes, absolutely, and without any hesitation. Easy to use, and has gone on to leave a consistent finish, and it has even brought out some of the rough surface texture from when the tiles were manufactured. I just need to keep on top of it now and wash and polish it every two weeks.

Used on 80 year old Minton tiles in hallway that are worn and dull. Had to use a soft cloth and multiple coats to gain any shine. Left at least 2 hours between coats. Hard wearing however not the nicest of smells when using you need to wear gloves.

Iv had my travertine tiles down just short of 5 years now. Apart from these initial impregnating bof the tiles when they were laid they've had no further treatment just the usual mopping. As such they were extremely dirty especially along the grout lines. There was also an issue where certain areas had lost there shine and looking dull. This is mostly where the dog tends to have her accidents in her old age. Iv got to say it was a long boring laborious process to get them back to standard. I first used the HG stone cleaner scrubbing the whole floor and grout before mopping multiple times to bring up all the cleaner. I then laidcotton sheets on the floor to protect it from people and dog traffic for 48 hrs to allow to fully dry. It then took 2 coats of HG stone impregnator then left and covered for another 24hrs. Finally I used this product putting a very thin coat on with a sponge squeezing out excess before wiping. It drys pretty quick and needed around an hour between coats which was good as I put 3 coats down. Although it was a long winded procedure I'm glad I did it. The floor is mirror smooth but no issues slipping on it as it still others grip. Liquids pool in the top allowing it to be quickly mopped away and I can now run a microfibre brush over the surface extremely quickly allowing a quick clean of the floor. I wish I'd done this originally and will keep up to the maintenance. It's so much easier to clean now. The floor has what I would describe as a mild sheen, not true gloss finish which is great as I prefer this to being too shiny. I would recommend 100% despite the effort. The cost of HG products is also great especially when you compare to alternatives from other manufacturers.

Really liked this product. After reading about it I wasn’t sure as people kept going on about the smell and other minor issues. However I found it really easy to use, the smell wasn’t too bad at all and it restored my tiles to how they were 7 years ago when they were brand new. It needed two coats but I used a small roller which was easy once I got the hang of it. It foamed up quite a lot at first so once I assessed how much was needed it went on really well. Dried quickly. I do have a couple of dogs but they were fine and went on it once it had dried. Hopefully that’s them sealed for a year when there is loads left to do it again. Attached a photo which is the ‘after’ picture. Should have taken a before pic but didn’t…

The jury still out with this one. May be me or my grit polish method why when after all sanding or polishing done it didn't make much of an improvement or really added to what I'd done already. We'll see

Great 👍

Shine