Cleaning tile grout

[TrashMaster G]

We have tiled floors in all our bathrooms and the kitchen. We also have a new puppy. It turns out that the grout was either not sealed or at least not sealed very well. Little puppy accidents have resulted in some staining of the grout in a couple of places.

Can this be cleaned? Bleached out? Is all hope lost?

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[TrashMaster G]

Anyone???

 

[MeaHorn]

i would like some advice on this as well...

 

[YChang]

I don't have any practical experience in this...but sine no one answered yet...here's what a random web site from Google had to say about this:

Everyday cleaning:

Immediately wipe up spills and messes. Use pH balanced cleaners and soap less detergents for daily cleaning. Agitate grout joints with a soft bristled brush to loosen debris. Thoroughly rinse, dry, and polish cleaned areas.

Acidic cleaners will eventually erode the grout in the joints making cleaning and maintenance more and more problematic. This is especially true if using acid cleaners on sanded grout installations.

This is due to the tendency of acid cleaners to eat away at the smaller aggregates first leaving the larger stain attracting aggregates behind.

Colored grout pigment can be permanently damaged by using acidic cleaners. This is especially true if used on a daily basis.

Heavy duty cleaning:

Again try to solve the heavy duty cleaning needs with pH balanced cleaners. These can include scouring cleaners and poultices manufactured for this purpose. Be sure to take advantage of a soft bristled brush to agitate the cleaners in the grout joints.

A good practice is to allow the cleaner to rest upon the surface to gain the full potential of the cleaner.

If these results are not acceptable, then proceed to the more aggressive high alkaline "heavy duty" or "deep clean" type cleaners available from good Manufacturers.

Commercial floor buffers or cleaning machines are perfectly suited to large areas of tile and grout. The biggest question here is the selection of the cleaning solution.

Again, it is very important to rinse the tile and grout thoroughly to remove any remaining cleaner.

If the result are not satisfactory using the PH balanced cleaners, it may be necessary to use a acidic solution to solve a particular problem.

Sulfamic and phosphoric acids are the safest and most used acids used in solving tile and grout cleaning problems. These two acids have very specific mixing and application recommendations that must be followed to the letter.

Regardless, thoroughly rinse the cleaned area, dry, and polish.

 

[chuychanga]

Tile Your World _ It's the Hornfans of the tile industry.

Also, there are some grout cleaners at Home Depot back in the tile section. But look around on Tile Your World first. They were a huge help when I laid tile in my house.

 

[EEE]

i second john bridge's site. the people there helped me tile two tub surrounds and several floors. lots of pros hang out there.

i remember reading more than one thread there about tile grout where john bridge himself said that the best grout color to choose is "mopwater grey". you can get it clean though: my sister used oxyclean and a floor scrubber in her kitchen and it looks great. probably whiter than the original color, but better than before.

 

[horn4life]

If you're really lazy you could just take a bunch of vitamins and pee all over the grout yourself to "even out" the color..

 

[John Bridge]

I want to thank both chuychanga and EEE for mentioning our web site. We are always happy to assist folks in their tiling projects or in just about anything else, including world politics and domestic matters.

Go Horns

John Bridge, Houston TX

John Bridge/Tile Your World Forums

 

[Lone Star]

John Bridge himself. Wow!

BTW, great Website -- tons of useful tips.

 

[LittleHornChick]

hey, TMG, I got seven cute little lab puppies that pee and poop everywhere, non-stop. any suggestions?