Coping Surface Question

[Ed in Socal]

Part two of my questions for remodeling - my pool has concrete rounded nose coping, and with one exception, they are in great shape physically.

The problem with them is their surface. When they were new, they had a tan, shiny coating on them. Lacquer, shellac, varnish, whatever it is they were coated with. That btw is a stupid dangerous thing to choose because they are slick as ice when they get wet.

After 20 years, the coating is partially gone, leaving each coping block with a mottled appearance, some more than others. Neither of the companies that have quoted so far had any answers at all. Except new coping which would be another $10k.

So the question is, can I clean up these coping blocks without destroying them, and the grout between them? Possible ideas have included sand blasting, manual acid wash, concrete paint stripper, i.e. Klean Strip from Home Depot. All these sound like a lot of work. But I want that shiny stuff gone. Other option I heard was to put some other non-slippery surface coating on them, but I'd bet you have to strip off the old stuff anyway to get anything new to stick.

Anyone have any experience with something like this?

thanks

 

[kimkats]

It will be a lot of work to get it gone but it will worth it in the end. I would not reseal it as you will be right back where you started from. I would try the manual acid wash or such as I think that will be easier to clean up as you go. I worry about the sand blasting as it will be a pain to get the sand and *stuff* it blasts off cleaned up.

 

[Ed in Socal]

Update, I tried some xylene based paint stripper, Klean Strip over the weekend. Didn't even make a dent in the finish. Guess I'll go for a mild acid wash next, although keeping it away from the grout is going to be tricky.

 

[kimkats]

Good luck!

 

[Ed in Socal]

Been awhile since I updated this. I got some muriatic acid and did some experiments.

I diluted the acid to 3 parts water, 1 part acid. I dribbled the liquid on a couple of coping blocks, in the places where the shiny surface was and let it bubble. Then scrubbed with a rough scotch pad. That basically works, although it took a couple of applications. But it did cut the shiny surface off down to the concrete. I realize though that to scale this up is going to require some different tools, as I have 135 coping blocks and I am not going to hand scrub each of them. I'll need a bigger acid resistant brush or scrubbing pad

Still cheaper than new coping, I'm just still surprised that no one I've talked to has had any ideas about this. The last salesman I had out actually couldn't tell the coping was concrete, he thought they were stone!

 

[kimkats]

Well done!! So lets talk about large scale for the scrubber...... Sanding pole is what I am seeing in my head. See if they have a "scrubby" head attachment. When I say scrubby I am thinking of the plastic scrubbers for dishes but on a larger scale AND be attached to the pole .