follow the yellow brick road , right into my kitchen!

[robgil]

What do you think guys? I have had an eager peek at the floor in my kitchen. They are yellow/white bricks and look like they have been there for a long time. I would really like to restore these but ms robgil says 'only if they come up clean' which is fair enough i suppose.
they look like they have some kind of old sealant on them , could this be oil or wax? Any ideas what i can use to clean them? If i cannot get them clean i will simply put a new floor down over the top of them but it would be a real shame not to bring them back into the world.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Hmmm, can you get matching bricks to replace the really bad ones? I love a brick floor myself and think it's worth the effort - much nicer than some modern tile thing.

Cleaning- I had amazing results with a good old fashioned bristle scrubber and this stuff:

http://www.agwoodcare.co.uk/gbu0-prodshow/liberon_stone_floor_cleaner.html

The other possibility is to lift them all, clean them all, rearrange so that the best are around the edge, and then to treat your about-to-have-a baby wife to a lovely bit of rush matting on all but the edges. I saw it recently in Isaac Newton's house and I was completely overwhelmed by the beauty and simplicity of it, so much so that I've decided not to go looking for a brick floor underneath my modern tiles, even though I'm certain one is there, but just to lay this stuff on top.

http://www.rushmatters.co.uk/englishrush.htm

 

[robgil]

Hmmm, can you get matching bricks to replace the really bad ones? I love a brick floor myself and think it's worth the effort - much nicer than some modern tile thing.

Cleaning- I had amazing results with a good old fashioned bristle scrubber and this stuff:

http://www.agwoodcare.co.uk/gbu0-prodshow/liberon_stone_floor_cleaner.html

The other possibility is to lift them all, clean them all, rearrange so that the best are around the edge, and then to treat your about-to-have-a baby wife to a lovely bit of rush matting on all but the edges. I saw it recently in Isaac Newton's house and I was completely overwhelmed by the beauty and simplicity of it, so much so that I've decided not to go looking for a brick floor underneath my modern tiles, even though I'm certain one is there, but just to lay this stuff on top.

http://www.rushmatters.co.uk/englishrush.htm

That rush looks good but i fear my cat would destroy it the way she has destroyed every thing else in the house. Pulling the bricks up isn't an option , they are laid to sand and have worn well so there are 'puddles' where heavy traffic has sank them into the sand over many years of use, i would never be able to get them back the same way.
I have had another eager excavation and now can conclude that they are old pamment floor bricks , red , yellow, pink and orange. Some have a coating of what could be screed residue , its rough to touch like sand paper and cement away brick acid rises to the occasion in a burst of bubbly activity when applied neat. The rest are very dirty and look to have old sealant on them.
The bad news is around 30 - 40 percent are missing from one end of the kitchen , the floor stops just over half way across , they also change direction (pattern) half way across so i am assuming there were walls there at one point segmenting the kitchen into two , perhaps three rooms.

Anyhow , would you even try to restore them knowing that you would have to source a lot more to complete the job?

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Anyhow , would you even try to restore them knowing that you would have to source a lot more to complete the job?

Yes I wood.

It will be hard work, and maybe expensive and tricky to source replacements, but I think the whole history of an old place is often expressed in its original floors. Think of the countless footsteps that have worn away those bricks to the shapes they are now. Trace the history of now forgotten walls in the pattern of bricks. Imagine what they will look like cleaned and sealed.

Now imagine a new floor over the top.

There's no competition in my book. I think you have all the makings of a lovely restored floor there.

 

[robgil]

I think you are right FW , it is the only remaining original floor in the house , the rest have been replaced with concrete.
I am going to leave the rest of it covered in the screed for now and uncover them when i have plastered the kitchen , hopefully i shall have sourced some more by then.

 

[MdB]

Yes I wood.

Quick - Hit the edit button before Penners gets here!

 

[Penners]

Yes I wood.

Quick - Hit the edit button before Penners gets here!

Too late! :evil:

Actually, I know perfectly well that FW only did that to wind me up. So I'm remaining calm..... serene...... unruffled......

But it's all going down in my little book.

 

[MdB]

But it's all going down in my little book.

Ey dred 2 thinc howe manie times Im' in their.

 

[yamin]

No contest for me, keep the brick. Hard work but lovely and worth the wait to source new. In fact, I'd rather have a few mismatches than cover up the brick. Good luck!

 

[Flyfisher]

But it's all going down in my little book.

Don't tell him your name FW . . . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V3SqxUomwk

As for the floor bricks, if it's the only original floor remaining then I'd really try to keep it.

Our old kitchen floor had old, very worn, 'linoleum'-type tiles on top of about half-an-inch of bitumen. When the old Rayburn was removed from the fireplace it revealed quarry tiles, which appeared to continue underneath the bitumen. With visions of uncovering a ready-tiled floor I started to take up the bitumen, only to discover that they only extended for two tiles into the room before encountering solid concrete.

 

[Penners]

No contest for me, keep the brick. Hard work but lovely and worth the wait to source new. In fact, I'd rather have a few mismatches than cover up the brick.

Me too. I bet that a bit of trawling around the salvo yards would find you some perfect or close matches.

 

[yamin]

And we all know how irksome a trawl around the salvage yards on a warm summers day is!

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Yes I wood.

Well, its troo, I wud kepe them.

 

[Penners]

FW - your speling is worse than anything you can immagine and i do not think you will ever be the BRANE of BRITAIN - chiz chiz. But try hard and you mite be winer of the mrs joyful prize for rafia work.

 

[Moo]

Can you raed this? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. __
I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in what oerdr the ltteres in a word are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is that the frsit and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it whotuit a pboerlm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed this forwrad it

 

[LadyArowana]

Can you raed this? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. __
I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in what oerdr the ltteres in a word are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is that the frsit and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it whotuit a pboerlm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed this forwrad it

If we never see Mr P here again I will hold you personally responsible for the poor chaps demise!

 

[robgil]

aT leeSt, HE . iS yooSing tHe. CuraKt pooNcuAtooN n GraMMa$.,,

 

[Penners]

Can you raed this? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can.

If we never see Mr P here again I will hold you personally responsible for the poor chaps demise!

No, Mr Preview, I'm playing all the right notes. But not necessarily in the right order.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwGOlERYa24

 

[AMc]

We found a bunch of floor bricks underneath 20C screeds. As we had to excavate, level and insulate they all had to come up. As they were on sand this was pretty painless though there were a few that were concreted in or failed as they were lifted.
If you choose not to lift them then you'll need to accept the necessity to accommodate moisture movement - esp. important in a kitchen which is normally a 'wetter' room than most.

As far as cleaning goes I would pull up all that screed asap. When we lifted the screed off ours they were covered in a black sticky bitumen like substance which I was dreading, but a few days exposed to air and it dried up and powered and was simply brushed off.

As our bricks were up they were all pressure washed and then the worst ones treated with brick acid. Not sure pressure washing indoors would be a good idea. I'd start with a bucket of ecover floor soap, a scrubbing brush and a green brillo pad and see how you get on.

Yellow floor bricks as you've shown are reasonably common in East Anglia (I have a load). If you need extra then lift a couple to take as samples, measure A LOT to make sure they're actually the same size and then ring around the reclamation yards and check Salvo - I think you'll find what you need without too much trouble or expense.

There are a few up at the moment
http://www.salvo.co.uk/suffolk/forsale.html?key=floor%20bricks
Though their prices are somewhat optimistic. You should be able to beat them down a bit esp. if you take folding money. I paid £3.50 each for 9"x9"x2" pamments last summer so £2 each is on the high side of right.