DuPont StoneTech Pro Sealers

[udailey]

Edit: added lots of photos of stone/deck sealing process as well as a dessicant and pvc compressed air drier I built for the sand blaster

Additional Edit: The guys at StoneTech repeatedly told me that the base ingredients in the Saltwater Pro and the Heavy Duty Pro were the same. Check the MSDS. Not so. So I called stonetooling.com and was told I am correct.. not the same. Stonetooling told me that I can put the Saltwater Pro on just about anything and to definitely use it on coping and stuff directly near the pool i.e. 3ft or less. I asked about layering it and you must put either Saltwater Pro on top of itself or the HD on top of Saltwater Pro or on top of HD but Saltwater Pro can not go on top of HD, so once you layer SWP with HD you must then do your semi-annual upkeep with HD. The reason is that HD is solvent based and will stick to itself and the water based SWP but the SWP will not adhere to a previous layer of HD. I asked about my waterfall with super absorbent moss rock. Stonetooling told me they would use solvent based on that, so HD which is in contradiction with the suggestion to use SWP closest to water. Its like Russian Roulette trying to make sense of the answers from the pros.

I recently got quotes for removing scale from the sides of the pool and then for sealing the stone around the pool as well as the concrete/pebble decking. All in all about 750 square feet. Grand total? About 2500.... WTH? Last year I got the same quote for 1300 and 1500 but from different contractors. I must be a serious tightwad. I should have taken the 1300 offer last year but he wouldnt produce a copy of the warranty and that bugged me. So, after being quoted 1000 for the scale removal I bought a sand blaster, face mask and filter, and blast media (glass bead) all for about 330. After getting the 1500 quote to seal I just purchased the DuPont sealers for about 330 as well. I am sure I bought too much but its good to have extra for upkeep. I spoke with a rep from StoneTech and he recommended the Pro Enhancer/Sealer and the HD Sealer but I decided to go with the Salt Sealer and HD. The enhancer/sealer was 190 a gallon and the cheapskate in me said no. He said to lay down the Enhancer first in one to two layers depending on how I like it. If I liked two layers then just stay like that as it will resist the salt and then do upkeep with HD after a few years.

30.96000	StoneTech Professional Salt Water Resistant Sealer, Gallon	2	$114.18	$228.36
30.89000	StoneTech Professional Heavy Duty Exterior Sealer, Gallon	2	$52.98	$105.96

I got the sealers from stonetooling.com. The prices were awesome compared to even Amazon. Shipping was another 30 dollars.

I'll keep this updated with how the sealing goes.
After applying I will be switching to saltwater. I have to finish the bead blasting and figure out how to remove the beads from the water. Maybe I'll stumble upon some great idea but right now it seems I have to drain and sweep/vacuum. I am considering using the filter pump to pump the beads into the filter. I am worried that I might damage the pump but I am also thinking a rented pump from Home Depot will run me around 80 plus filling the pool will be another 200 so a new filter pump might not be so bad anyway.
Well, anyway. I'll keep you updated.
Uriah

 

[JVTrain]

Sounds like a great project. Keep us posted.

Also...

 

[udailey]

Rented a power washer to wash the decking within an inch of its life. I wanted it to get as close to new as possible before applying the sealer. The power washer was not doing a great job at removing some mildew so I returned it and had some guys from Taskaway Services here in The Woodlands come out and power wash the deck. I'm super thrilled with the great job they did and at $125 for 750 sq ft of decking I was thrilled with the price as well. As soon as that dried I started on the stone around the circumference of the pool. I finished that last night. So, so far I have about 120 sq ft covered with the StoneTech Saltwater Sealer. Its about the consistency and appearance of milk. I applied it to the stone with a brush which worked pretty well but its slow going. I think its the most efficient, as far as not using a lot of product, way to apply on a horizontal surface that is mostly flat. When I tried bushing on the concrete decking that is embedded with 1/4" pebbles this did not go well.
So with the stone around the pool I just brushed on a slightly less than generous amount. I got the whole stone wet and the product would pool in low spots. Then I would continue to the next stone until the brush was dry then go back to the first stone and brush it with the dry brush which would redistribute the pooled sealer. They warn against allowing the sealer to pool. Even after this it will begin to pool again so once I had got down the line about 10 minutes I would come back again and soak up the pools with the brush and redistribute. This I considered one application. You need to do two. It uses much less sealer the second time and you end up with significant pooling. Still almost all the sealer would soak in and after 15 minutes I would come by and redistribute then come by with a cloth and soak up any tiny amount left pooling. Man, that sounds like a pain in the rear now that I read it. Anyway, thats what I did and this morning it looks just as it did before I sealed it which is what we're after.
With the decking around the pool having embedded stone the brush just prompted instant pooling between all the stones. Not a good approach. I will try a roller and a sponge for the decking and I suppose a sprayer might be a good way to go to if I was to spray first, then roll to redistribute. The sprayer approach bugs me a bit as I might miss some spots that are too small to see allowing the salt a way in. We'll see.
When I went to check it this morning I had forgotten to turn off the sprinklers.... Shoot! Its supposed to cure for 72 hours with no water! Well only 4 of the flagstones had water droplets on them but they had all sat nicely on the surface and not soaked in yet. I soaked them up with a cloth and have fingers crossed that I wont get any filmy residue where the water ended up. Sprinkler system now turned off...
If youre in The Woodlands and need pressure washing give Mark a call at Taskaway. His website is http://www.taskawayservices.com and the number is 832-516-2423. As I said before I was really happy with how clean everything turned out, how fast they managed the job and how little it cost. Renting the power washer was going to cost me about 50% of what they charged and as I tried for about an hour it was obviously going to take me a minimum of 8 hours. They must have knocked it out in under 1.5 hours. I'm not affiliated with them in anyway except being a happy customer.
Pics to follow.
Uriah

 

[udailey]

Ok, I will ramble on a bit more. This is in regards to bead blasting.
The bead blasting sucked. I still wouldnt pay their prices but it was more work than I had expected and am still waiting for inspiration to hit me on how to remove the beads from the pool without hurting my pump or back. I have a few days to figure it out.
Here was the process:
I bought a bead blaster from Northern Tool. I already had a big air compressor and air line. Here is what I bought from them
110 lb. Pressurized Abrasive Blaster
I purchased 150 lbs of #8 glass bead from a local abrasive media dealer for $23 per bag. 50lb per bag.
From the same dealer I bought a good quality 3M face mask with air filters on it for $15 as well as gloves with gauntlets on them for literally $1.50 and a facemask that looks kind of like a welder's mask with 3 replaceable face screens (basically just a plastic shield you replace as the backsplash of beads slowly sandblasts the shield til you cant see through it anymore). I got the mask for around $10.
You fill the blaster to about 3/4 full. Keep top and bottom ball valves closed. Attach compressor to the top ball valve at the npt connection after the compressor it at full psi. Remember to adjust the output regulator of your compressor to not allow output psi to be above 125 which is max for this blaster. I set mine at 80psi. CFM really is king here and I didnt have a lot of cfm so I had to increase my psi to 80. I hear 40 to 50 is better but then you need more cfm than I had available.
Now turn top ball valve on and the blaster will pressurize. Then squeeze the trigger and start slowly opening the bottom ball valve till you see media start to come out of the blaster. Good. Now at about 3 inches from the wall, let er rip. Its slow going. 1 sq ft per maybe 3 minutes when its all flowing great. My problem was after 30 minutes or so the thing clogged and I could hit it with a mallet and get media moving again but sooner or later it just completely clogs. Humidity and heat plugged it up. The hot air carries a lot of water in it and then we compress it down and the quickly expand it. Condensation occurs in the blaster and the sand gets wet and wont drop into the ball valve to be carried away by the air flow.
Shoot.. what to do. I researched and guys use air driers. I figured I could build one so I bought 2.5ft of 1.5" pvc which will support 280psi. I put a 1.5" coupler at each end with a threaded end so I could screw in the 1.5" to .75" reducer. The reducer had a .75 female end that was threaded. So now I could screw in a .75" to .25" reducer into that with also a female threaded end at the .25 end. So this is replicated on both sides of the 1.5" pipe. The .25" threaded ends get a male npt adapter screwed into them. All threads on the whole thing get teflon tape. So now weve got this long tube with male .25" npt nipples at each end. So you can attach a compressed air hose to each side of it. Now how to make it a drier... Buy some silica dessicant. You can get a few pounds on amazon for about $21. Here is what I bought Amazon.com: Hydrosorbent 900 Gram Silica Gel for 66 Cubic SG-900: Home Improvement
You need to fill the tube with this. First you need to make sure it wont get out of the tube. I used a sponge. Something like what you would use to apply a sealer to your wood floor. I picked the sponge by blowing through a few sponges and finding the one that was easiest to blow through. Then I cut a 1.5" circle out of the sponge, twice. I put one circle at each end of the pipe with the dessicant in between. So, pipe is full of dessicant that cant escape.
Once I got this into the system I now had 50ft of air hose and could just about go anywhere so it struck me that I could put the compressor in the house and turn the AC down low. This makes the air in the house less humid. The hose came out the door, into the drier I built, then into another hose and into the blaster. You want pic, I know, but its already done. I will take a pic of the drier in a few minutes though.
I finished the job with no trouble at all from humidity. The little condensation catcher at the input of the blaster didnt even have one drop in it. So now I have a decent blasting system at home for all those times I need one... huh. It'll probably sit forever so if you live around here let me know if you want to borrow it. I really cant think of another reason to use it. Maybe in 5 years if I neglect my duties to my pool and get more calcium build up.
Uriah

 

[udailey]

- - - Updated - - -

Well, I do have more sealing to do so I will post some sealing photos later today.

 

[udailey]

First minute after application. This is a step at the entry to the backdoor that is made out of the same stone as the surround of the pool that I sealed last night. This step will see a lot of salt water drips.

 

[udailey]

Thats 8 minutes later. I haven't touched it yet.

 

[udailey]

Ok. About 15-20 minutes after application. Going to do second coat.

Less applied for second coat as experiments yesterday proved on this stone that less soaks in, but not much less.

 

[udailey]

Only stippled the brush in pools after second coat. Here we are 13 minutes after second coat. In a few minutes I will dab the stone with a microfiber cloth and take a pic.

You can see the grout has a small pool and on the left bottom side there is almost a film of white. When I dab it it will go away. See? :

So there it is 15 minutes after second coat and after dabbing with microfiber cloth. Now it cures for three days but in less than an hour in this 95 degrees heat it will look completely dry. I think last night on the stone around the pool I could have used a little more on the second coat but I am hoping I used enough. I am wondering when I reapply in a few years if I need to do some sort of sealer stripping process to lay down the new stuff or if I just pile it on top of the remainder of the old stuff.

 

[udailey]

So here is the tiny deck leading to the kitchen. Not a lot of salt water action will take place here and no rain as its covered. I think one layer of salt water sealer is fine here.

Think I'll leave this area with just one coat. This stuffs expensive!

 

[firehunter]

Hi, Just checking in to see how the StoneTech Professional Salt Water Resistant Sealer is holding up on your stone. We are thinking of a SWG and will have travertine coping and a moss rock water fall, so would like to seal it all.

 

[lardo5150]

Hitting this thread as well, wanted to see how the sealant held up.

 

[Wrinkled fingers]

You did a very similar job that I did recently, I posted my equipment setup on TFP also using a soda blaster from harbor freight. I think using a old 54 quart cooler, coiling about 25 feet of hose in it and filling with ice, with a water separator at the exit would work too for getting the moisutre out. I didn't do that but used dessicant and routed the hose through the house as you did. I used the pool blasting media Maxx strip PF2 which is water soluble and sucked out the residue with a trash pump.

I used the Aldon solvent based sealer on my pool rocks, some were decomposed granite that crumbled into the pool with water feature on. The Aldon stuff was amazing and worked better than my expectations, crumbling rocks are now glued together and sealed tight, gave a very slight gloss but looks good.

 

[Divin Dave]

I didn't use the stone tech, but used EAGLE glossy sealer from Home Depot. Only available online. Going into year 5 now. I originally rolled on 2 coats and I have a SW pool.

Mine has held up pretty well but doesnt quite look as good as it did when new. Im sure it could go at least 1 more year without a problem, but Im thinking about giving it a new coat this spring.

I pretty happy than i can go at least 4 or 5 years before resealing.