[Dave Lissaman]

Been contacted by a cleaner friend who has had one of her cleaners clean a terracotta floor with sugar soap which has apparently bleached the colour out the floor. I'm looking at it tomorrow so will know more then but any ideas what might have happened?

[Tadgh O Shea]

Hi Dave, sugar soap is a very aggressive cleaning chemical containing some very corrosive ingredients like sodium hydroxide amongst others and needs to be used with caution, for deep cleaning terracotta tiles there are much safer and more effective methods, you can use neutral based floor cleaning solutions in combination with microcleaning floor mops which will easily remove heavily ingrained soils from terracotta tiled surfaces without causing any detrimental damage, if you can take some pics when you see the job tomorrow and post them up here lets see if we can help you out further.  Tadgh

[Kev Martin]

Been contacted by a cleaner friend who has had one of her cleaners clean a terracotta floor with sugar soap which has apparently bleached the colour out the floor. I'm looking at it tomorrow so will know more then but any ideas what might have happened?

It won't have bleached any colour out of the floor.  What it has probably done is removed either the dirt patina or sealer's off the floor.  The whole lot will probably now need doing to get it to blend

[Dave Lissaman]

Kevin
Turned out it was sealed with linseed oil. The sugar soap had dissolved it and the cleaner had swilled it around the floor
Test patches indicate the residue is easy to remove so booked in to strip back and seal properly

[Kev Martin]

Kevin
Turned out it was sealed with linseed oil. The sugar soap had dissolved it and the cleaner had swilled it around the floor
Test patches indicate the residue is easy to remove so booked in to strip back and seal properly

The problem is that Linseed Oil coupled with White Spirit was used years ago to try and seal floors.  They were mixed together and the White Spirit acted as the transport system to get the Linseed Oil into  the stone and then it evaporated.  The oil then filled all the capillaries  and voids sub surface and hence darkened / enhanced the colour.  The failing is unlike a modern Penetrating enhancing sealer such as Miracle 511 Seal & Enhance  the oil never cured.  So that is how it was dragged out.  Specifying Linseed Oil these days is like walking into a car showroom and asking for a starting handle instead of an ignition  key.

Deep clean the floor and once done damp the whole floor with water to make sure it dampens evenly you can then be sure you will be able to seal with a Modern Penetrating  enhancing sealer to restore the colour permanently and leave the floor with an even enhanced  aesthetic appearance 

[Dave Lissaman]

thanks for the tip about wetting the floor before the seal to check its even
im going back a few days after the clean to seal so it should be dry by then