Sealing a Sandstone Floor

I need to seal and improve the colour of the stone flagged floor in our kitchen. I'm fairly certain that the flags are sandstone and have cleaned them using Lithofin so they now look very clean but a little dull (slight understatement there). Can anyone recommend a method of sealing and enhancing the colour of the flags? I've seen lots of recommendations for linseed oil on limestone and slate but no mention of sandstone. Would linseed oil be the way to go?

I can't recommend the Liberon products highly enough. The stone cleaner, followed by the stone sealer ( which has a lot of linseed oil in it) then the stone floor wax, available on various online DIY stores. It takes about a week but the smell and transformation are glorious. I know a lot of people dislike removing the history off floors, but mine smelt really bad and didn't look like they'd been cleaned in 200 years. Bucket after bucket of muddy water went out the door. Check out this thread.

http://www.periodproperty.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=11123&p=138447&hilit=Cleaning+flagstone+floor#p138447

Good luck, post pics!

Well.... I've already purchased some Liberon boiled linseed oil and turpentine following some advice found elsewhere on this fine forum (although not advice specifically for sandstone), and tested it out on 2 flags. I applied a single coat of linseed oil diluted 3:1 with turpentine, the results weren't quite what I expected. Mostly the oil was absorbed within 12 hours and looks like it needs a second coat but in places the oil pooled and is still tacky 48 hours later, see photo below. I've read on another thread of this happening after several coats but I guessed that a single dilute coat would be no problem.

Shall I continue but mop up any surplus oil that remains on the surface after a few hours or should I abandon the oil and go for the Liberon stone cleaner and sealer (which I note lists sandstone on the data sheet). Any advice would be much appreciated.

My guess is that the oil pooled because the porosity of the stone wblockading by long ingrained grime. Stickiness can be a problem with linseed oil. If it were mine, I'd scrub it all off with the cleaner and then use the liberon sealer very sparingly, building in multiple coats where the stones drink it in ( my floor needed a lot of coats of sealer) and not using as much where it pools.

I should stress that this is just one approach and my advice isn't professional.

it will depend on the porosity of the sandstone, some parts will be denser than other, and as Joce says, some will still be full of dirt.
Use a cloth or brush and brush the pooled bits to the soaked in bits if you like the look of the oiled floor.

Would Joce's Liberon treatment work on my manky old pamments?




After seeing her flags 'in the stone' so to speak, I came home, looked at my floors, and realised that Something Must Be Done.