Author: chicagostonepro
Subject: river white granite absorbancy
Posted: 06 Aug 2011 at 9:53am
Subject: river white granite absorbancy
Posted: 06 Aug 2011 at 9:53am
Hi airw,
I apologize for the late response.
That material is quite porous, as are venetian gold and bianco romano.
I know this material, and in fact, ran into the same situation you describe with it, where the fabricator sealed it with Stone Tech Bulletproof - and it didn't work.
Bulletproof is a great name, isn't it? It used to be a great sealer too - until DuPont bought the StoneTech, and changed Bulletproof into a water-base sealer. Now, it's overpriced garbage, imo.
Here's my hypothesis on this: Anything that resists water will block a water base sealer. That includes resin treatments, oil, wax, water itself, and especially any sealer of any type. Material that's got a lot of pores, or even a moderate amount of pores that happen to be big pores, require more than one sealer application. The big pores stuff can easily require three to five applications to layer in enough polymer spheres, silicone, fluorocarbon, etc.
The solvent in solvent base sealers disrupts weak sealer structure, and redistributes the active components into higher concentrations with subsequent applications. The water in water base sealers can't do this.
In the case I took care of, I used a product called Stain Proof, by DryTreat. It penetrated the Bulletproof, did it's work just fine. However, that product uses an entirely different process to protect the stone, and takes five days to develop initial oil resistance, with full protection developed on day 30. On River White, you can expect even water to get through it initially, if it sits on the stone during that first five day period.
You can use the stone - it will rapidly dry out - and you won't be smelling any solvent after the first hour or so, but the process takes its own time - walk on egg shells for 5 days, take care after that to clean any exposures right away, and relax after day 30. That's not license to never clean your stone, however.
So, in your testing, keep that five day period in mind. This is true of any sealer anyway - you always wait for the cure period before you can conduct a valid test of the protection.
Regards.
I apologize for the late response.
That material is quite porous, as are venetian gold and bianco romano.
I know this material, and in fact, ran into the same situation you describe with it, where the fabricator sealed it with Stone Tech Bulletproof - and it didn't work.
Bulletproof is a great name, isn't it? It used to be a great sealer too - until DuPont bought the StoneTech, and changed Bulletproof into a water-base sealer. Now, it's overpriced garbage, imo.
Here's my hypothesis on this: Anything that resists water will block a water base sealer. That includes resin treatments, oil, wax, water itself, and especially any sealer of any type. Material that's got a lot of pores, or even a moderate amount of pores that happen to be big pores, require more than one sealer application. The big pores stuff can easily require three to five applications to layer in enough polymer spheres, silicone, fluorocarbon, etc.
The solvent in solvent base sealers disrupts weak sealer structure, and redistributes the active components into higher concentrations with subsequent applications. The water in water base sealers can't do this.
In the case I took care of, I used a product called Stain Proof, by DryTreat. It penetrated the Bulletproof, did it's work just fine. However, that product uses an entirely different process to protect the stone, and takes five days to develop initial oil resistance, with full protection developed on day 30. On River White, you can expect even water to get through it initially, if it sits on the stone during that first five day period.
You can use the stone - it will rapidly dry out - and you won't be smelling any solvent after the first hour or so, but the process takes its own time - walk on egg shells for 5 days, take care after that to clean any exposures right away, and relax after day 30. That's not license to never clean your stone, however.
So, in your testing, keep that five day period in mind. This is true of any sealer anyway - you always wait for the cure period before you can conduct a valid test of the protection.
Regards.