What is the best way to clean grout?

Question

I installed a tile floor, grouted it and then sealed the whole thing. I double sealed the grout, and it STILL looks filthy.

Can anyone give tips for cleaning grout? Also, what do you use to seal it?

JD Martin · Answer

Do you walk barefoot or have animals? I say this from experience, that the oils from the body will eventually seep into the grout and I haven't found a good way of getting it all out; scrubbing lifts the top stain but it eventually just comes back through.

Jassem A. · Answer

Grout pen might work:

http://www.homedepot.com/p/Miracle-Sealants-Grout-...

Otherwise you could add more grout or try remove some of the old grout with a multitool and redo it

Hattie Dizmond · Answer

Depends on the color of the grout, but I'm guessing, since you think it looks "filthy", that it's white.  If so, I still swear by a paste of baking soda and bleach.

Make the paste like cake batter and pour it along the grout lines.  The moisture - bleach - will seep into the grout slowly, all the better to perform the bleaching.  Once the mixture is mostly dry, use a squirt bottle with bleach to moisten the baking soda and a tooth brush or scrubbing brush to scrub the grout line.

Baking soda has an amazing amount of very gentle abrasiveness, which should lift any surface stains that remain from the bleaching.  As a kid there was very little my grandmother didn't believe baking soda and something could clean.

As for sealing, I like Miracle Sealants 511.

Jonathan Towell · Answer

Lowes and Home Depot have all kinds of grout cleaning products. Some of the heavy duty ones (the kinds that need rubber gloves to use) work really well. Something like this will probably clean it up:

http://www.1877floorguy.com/hedutiandgrc1.html

Scott Weaner · Answer

Interestingly, I just accidentally discovered that a disinfectant cleaning wipe can clean grout. I was wiping up a spill, and a bit of rubbing cleaned the grout quite a bit.

Dumitru Anton · Answer

@Mindy Jensen,

I would got to a big lots/dollar store and buy a couple of power toothbrushes. or get a good round brush into a longer bolt into your drill and have a go. or attach a stiff brush to a multitool/vibrating sander (i know you have at least one of those in your collection :-P )

before bleach, first try peroxide + baking soda (or any oxy type of booster) + hot water

you could try steam cleaning (not sure of effects of steam on porous travertine)

source: whole tiled basement with former dirty owners and dogs. i didn't have travertine so i used some vinegar for boost. pretty clean after 3 moping-sessions.

Hattie Dizmond · Answer

It should be fine, but I would dilute the bleach, if you're using it on a uber porous stone like travertine.  Also, since you retiled it, you probably have some left over tiles.  Just run a test on a scrap piece.

Molly S Ringer · Answer

I've had good success using a paste of bleach, oxyclean powder, and blue dawn dish soap.  I put the oxyclean in my container first and mix with a tiny bit of hot water, then dawn, then bleach.  Use a stiff nylon bristle brush and scrub the crud out of the grout, let it set until the bleach and oxyclean lighten it up enough for you, and then rinse it really well.

Good luck!

Hattie Dizmond · Answer

Just a note about the hydrogen peroxide, an oxygen bleach.  That's a great option for simple, non-set organic stains.  (Blood and wine are good examples.), but, the 3% hydrogen peroxide you buy at the corner store isn't really strong enough to do much with more complex &/or set-in stains.  Chlorine bleach is a whole different story.  When Chlorine reacts with water, it produces hydrochloric acid and atomic oxygen (For those of you following along, that's O not O+O, which is what we actually breathe.)  That unstable, atomic oxygen reacts with the chromophores in the stain and break down their structure to eliminate the part that contains the color.

End of geeky science lesson for today!   :-)

What is the best way to clean grout?

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