In addition to painting homes and offices, we
offer tile a variety of caulking and glazing services. At A-Clean Look we believe that the foundation of our business
rests on three main principals: Solid Work Ethic, Customer Satisfaction
and versatility.
Contact us today for all of
your Chicago caulking & glazing work needs.
A Clean Look Caulking Hints and Tips
1.
Your caulking bead can stay neat and even.
Here is a trick to keeping that caulking bead looking straight and
clean. Use masking tape to tape off the areas around the seam you
are caulking, keeping the two pieces of tape at a distance the size
of the desired bead. Lay down your bead of caulk. Use your finger to
tool the caulk by pushing the excess onto the tape. After tooling,
you can remove the masking tape and you'll find a very nice looking,
straight, clean, smooth bead of tooled caulk.
2.
Car polish can give your shower a great shine.
Next time you clean your bathroom, get out your car polish. Rub a
coat of polish on your ceramic or fiberglass shower enclosure.
You’ll get a wonderful shine and the water will bead up and roll off
before mildew or mold can begin to form. It will make your next
cleaning time a lot easier. However, DO NOT apply car polish the
floor of the shower - it would become a slippery place for an
accident ready to happen.
3. A paint stick is a great tool for smoothing caulk.
After you lay your bead of caulk, determine the width you want from
tooling and mask it off with masking tape. Next, take a paint stick
and clip off the corners to fit the desired width between the two
pieces of masking tape. Smooth out the bead of caulk with the paint
stick.
4. There is a way to unplug a used tube of caulk.
Take the tube and cut off the nozzle end so that the hole is
slightly larger than the first cut. Next, drive a screw into the
nozzle end of the hardened caulk and use the screw to pull the
hardened caulk out of the nozzle. A screw with course threads, such
as drywall or deck screws, will work the best.
5. Your
chipped ceramic tile can be repaired.
It’s very simple. All you need is appliance touchup paint. This
paint dries to a very hard finish and adheres well to smooth
surfaces. Appliance paint comes in only a few colors (white, almond,
green, yellow and back) but it can be tinted with other paint to
match your tile.
6. You
can cap-off your used cartridge of caulk.
You just finished your caulking job
and there’s product still left over in the tube. Here’s a couple of
quick ways to store your cartridge for later use:
- A plastic electrical connector is
an easy way to quickly seal and reopen the tube.
- If you can’t find a connector,
place a 2" nail into the end of the nozzle, then wrap the entire
nozzle tightly in Saran Wrap® or Reynolds Wrap®. This will keep the
caulk in the nozzle from hardening for use at a later date.
7. Sun-damaged wood fibers can cause
adhesion failure in caulks.
Surface wood fibers can be
appreciably damaged in as little as 2-4 weeks when exposed to
direct, intense sunlight. This has been determined by the USDA's
Forest Products Research Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin (in
repeated studies over many years). If a sealant (or a coating) is
applied to such damaged wood, it can lead to premature failure of
the sealant (or coating) because the sealant can much more readily
lose its adhesion. (In reality, the sealant adheres quite well to
the surface wood fibers themselves, but the surface fibers lose
their attachment to the bulk of the wood.)
8. Oil-based
caulking compounds can cause windows to "fog up."
Make sure you never use an oil-based
caulking compound around insulating glass ("thermal-pane") windows.
The vegetable oils in these types of caulking compounds aggressively
attack polysulfide polymers (the primary sealants used for such
windows). The polysulfide degrades, cracks and causes the window to
fail and "fog up".
9. Shrinkage
of a caulking bead is not necessarily bad.
Sometimes "shrinkage" of a caulking
bead is thought to potentially lead to performance problems with the
sealant. While this can occur with some types of sealants (silicones
and polyurethanes, for instance), for many other types of sealants
it does not pose a real performance problem. Such products as
Acrylic Latex, Butyl, SBR, Polysulfide, and others do not suffer
severe performance problems when they experience a moderate amount
of shrinkage during their cure.
10. Elastomeric latex caulks need 1-3
days to cure.
Always give
elastomeric latex caulks plenty of time (1-3 days) to cure before
painting them. The reason is that these types of caulk are much more
elastic than any paint that is applied over them and the paint can't
stretch enough to avoid cracking during the caulk's curing (and
subsequent shrinkage).
How to Save Energy; Re-glaze Leaky Window Panes
If your
home
has windows that are glazed with putty, you might need to repair or
replace that glazing putty on occasion. Re-glazing windows is not a
real simple task, but with patience and attention to detail, it can
be done by most handy people.
If your home has windows with putty glazing, look closely at that,
looking for signs of cracks, drying out, separation from glass, or
even missing sections.
If any shows signs of significant cracking or drying; or if there
are chunks missing, you are paying extra for energy costs due to
leaky windows, and re-glazing can eliminate that added cost.
To re-glaze windows, you will need the following:
o Ladder, if windows are not reachable from ground level.
o Small putty knife
o Retractable razor-knife
o Small wood chisel
o Glazing push-pins
o Small hammer
o Wire brush
o Glazing putty
o Rag or cloth
o Mineral spirits
Start by removing as much loose, cracking or dried up glazing as you
can, using a retractable razor-knife, wire brush and small wood
chisel.
Caution: Be careful not to break the window panes!
Once you have removed loose glazing, clean remaining
dust and debris from around the panes with a cloth moistened with
mineral spirits. This also helps to soften the wood in preparation
to receive the glazing putty.
Once all glass panes are secured, begin re-glazing with the glazing
putty, using the small putty knife. Pick up some glazing from its
container with the putty knife.
Hold the putty knife against the glass and the wood so it will lay a
corner bead of glazing putty at approximately 45 degrees, against
both surfaces. Pull gently along the four sides of each glass pane.
Wipe excess putty and reuse for next area.
Note: To help prevent the putty knife from sticking to the putty and
thereby pulling the putty away from where you want it, try wiping it
frequently with your cloth dampened with mineral spirits.
Repeat as needed on all glass panes to be re-glazed.
Clean up by gently wiping the glass area within the new glazing,
with your cloth moistened with mineral spirits.
For best results, do not attempt to completely clean all the glass
until the glazing putty has had a chance to dry for at least 48
hours. Otherwise, you might loosen or even pull away some of the new
glazing.
Paint your new glazing only after it has dried thoroughly.
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