Browse Forums Flooring & Floor Covering 1 Oct 28, 2011 12:08 am Hi Everyone, I'm really hoping someone will be able to help me... We have been in our new house now for about 4 months. We had polished porcelain tiles laid, which I loved at first. However, now, not so much.... I've tried everything to try to clean them after noticing that they always look smudgy and cloudy. I initially just thought it was grout residue or something like that left on the tiles. But now I've realised that it actually looks like buff marks in the tiles. No amount of scrubbing or polishing has changed it. And its not just 1 or 2 tiles either, its the whole lot. I'm so annoyed at myself for not checking them before we laid them. We did get a sample and i did not see anything like it on the sample. Does anybody have any advice for us please. I dont think I can handle living with these tiles like this for the next 10 years And this is my dream home, so I dont plan on moving any time soon... Thank you in advance Rebecca Re: Problem with my polished porcelain... Please help 2Nov 01, 2011 8:42 pm If you do a search on polished porcelain on the forum, this is an old thread that talks about the haze. I cant search for you right now as Im on my phone. We have polished procelain in our bathrooms and I remember researching it before we bought our tiles. Custom European Cabinets - Melbourne Kitchen Specialist PM for business details as website currently being updated! Our Crazy Owner Builder Journey! Re: Problem with my polished porcelain... Please help 4Nov 03, 2011 7:07 am Maybe this is a case of optical hazing?? We got a brochure about that saying that it's "natural" and it can happen for ANY tile, cheap or exy, made in China or made in Italy. But, having said that, have you tried this: http://spiritsealers.com/product.php?idProduct=4 just to weed out any eventual wax residue. My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Re: Problem with my polished porcelain... Please help 5Nov 03, 2011 8:50 am Optical hazing can occure due to several reasons. Haze due to the polishing process: This is the most common reason as porcelains are made from high quality kaolin clay blended with other high quality refactories and fluxes creating a very hard body. The harder the body and more uniform the vitrification the better the polishing process will create a flat smooth surface that can reflect light which we see as a polish or shine. When a manufacture forms a body with a llower content or poorer quality of kaolin the porcelain body will be more difficult to polish resulting in reduced reflectivity and hence a lower digree of polish. This can look like a hazy, cloudy look. In this case this is not a fault it is simply a manufacture creating a polished porcelain for a price. There is no real solution in this case because the quality of the clay will most likely not allow for improved repolishing. There is also another reason as some manufatures do not replace the stones when polishing and this can create uneven blemishes in the tile it look like circular grinding marks. Keep in mind some manufactures are applying nano type sealers and this can also cause a haze look to the tile. The problems relating to hazy looking porcelain are restricted mainly to issues of how they are manufactureds such as kiln defects, polishing defects, quality of the clay and installation issues from grout haze, wax or even nano sealers. In turn optical hazing is not natural, it is from maunufactures making tiles for a price and giving out a brochure to an unhappy customer is just an effort that will hopefully make the customer go away. The goverment needs to look at this as there are so many people buying polished porcelain thinking they are going to get the shiny glassy look and the tile salesman just gives them a brochure after they complain. Craig Re: Problem with my polished porcelain... Please help 6Mar 22, 2012 2:16 pm When anyone has these tiles please check whether they are a 1st quality product. The Tile Council have told me that the packaging should have: a manufacturer's name or trade mark, a work size, the country of origin, whether they are glazed or unglazed, rectified or whether they are modular or non modular, the mark of 1st quality, or the type of tile and reference to the conforming Standard. Our packaging has none of the above and we have optical hazing - we're just debating whether it's worth spending $450 to have the Tile Council have a look at the tiles and write a report which we could take to the builder/supplier. As we've hit so many brick walls with the builder we are not confident of getting anywhere. For info on our build: viewtopic.php?f=31&t=43093 Built the McLaren by Dechellis - slab down 22 Feb - handover 30 Aug 2011 - and gardens finished 9 Dec 2012!! Re: Problem with my polished porcelain... Please help 7Mar 22, 2012 3:25 pm Mclaren When anyone has these tiles please check whether they are a 1st quality product. The Tile Council have told me that the packaging should have: a manufacturer's name or trade mark, a work size, the country of origin, whether they are glazed or unglazed, rectified or whether they are modular or non modular, the mark of 1st quality, or the type of tile and reference to the conforming Standard. Our packaging has none of the above and we have optical hazing - we're just debating whether it's worth spending $450 to have the Tile Council have a look at the tiles and write a report which we could take to the builder/supplier. As we've hit so many brick walls with the builder we are not confident of getting anywhere. Save your money because all the tile council is going to do is tell you it is optical hazing The builder/supplier got a great deal on these tiles. The only thing to do is tint the windows thats all you can do. 2 5858 I donβt think so as the floor area over 300 square meters then it is class 3β¦. 12 17940 Thankyou so much π I've decided on White on white for doors and trims, White on white 50% on ceiling and Mt buller for walls. Fingers crossed it will look OK π 2 7170 |