Hello all! I don't usually use forums so bear with me.
I've tiled my downstairs toilet, I grouted the floor tiles spaced at 3mm using a grey Mapei Keracolor SF. It was the first time I'd grouted but I'd followed a lot of advice online and it went down great and I was really happy with the result.
My next job was to grout the walls which use different tiles to the floor, I've used ceramic metro tiles spaced at 3mm also and bought the same Mapei Keracolor SF grout, this time in white. I followed exactly the same process as I had on the floor, however within 1-2 minutes of applying the grout, it was drying out and the grout float wasn't able to wipe away any excess without applying a fair amount of force. It looked awful so I removed what I'd put on. I tried again, this time with a slightly wetter mix to see if that helped. No luck, same result. On my third attempt I damped the tiles with a sponge first in an attempt to reduce how much moisture they absorbed, the grout still dried very quick so I didnt want to wait too long to wipe with a sponge, nor do it so quick the grout was too wet, but I managed to do about 8 tiles in just under an hour with ok results. However, as I was doing it I noticed you can see the tile absorbing the moisture from the grout underneath the glaze of the tile. There is a dark band around the edge of each tile which slowly grows as the tile takes on more moisture.
The tiles are obviously very porous so I'm wondering if any of you have any tips on how to stop them sucking all the moisture out the grout and leaving me a tiny window of opportunity to work in. Different grouts, anything, I'm open to suggestions! Thanks!
