White jointing compound or mortar - Looking for mortar that stays white

[temas]

Hi. I had some paving layed 5 years ago this summer. The slabs are 60x60x2 vitrified in a very light beige, with a slight natural finish, but overall the look I was going for was smooth and flat with a wash of continuous white.

I made it clear to the installers that I wanted the mortar to blend with the colour of the slabs and didn’t want to see obvious contrast. They recommended a jointing compound that was labelled ‘buff’ colour. I was very dubious at the time. On the hot sunny day it was applied it looked ok, not exactly matching, but it didn’t bother me too much. But then the rain came and it went dark brown and stayed that way until it dried out, which in summer takes about 3 days of no rain and in spring / autumn/ winter never happens.

Over the years it has also gathered dirt and moss and a lot of it has just worn away. It just looks rubbish. A fair few of the slabs have also come loose. I remember explaining to them that the slab supplier said they needed to add something to the cement to help the vitrified slabs stick, but they said it wasn’t necessary.

Anyway, this spring I plan to ‘re-stick’ the wobbly slabs and re-do the grouting. So I have two questions. What should I use to add to the cement, and is there a mortar or jointing compound that actually stays white or very light even when wet?

Not sure if you allow quotes here; feel free to PM me if it’s allowed, although I might just do it myself. The area is about 25m squared I think and i’m In North London.

Many Thanks

[seanandruby]

Hi Temas.
What you are looking for to add to your mix is S B R. As for the jointing someone will help you with that soon, as i am mostly a draInage guy.
in the meantime look here

[temas]

Many thanks for the SBR tip.

I think the jointing stuff that we used was different to that. They definitely didn’t wet the patio first and it was swept in dry. As I said, it goes a lot darker when wet. One good thing about it was that it is porous which helps distribute the drainage a bit.

The drainage has actually been quite successful - I came up with the idea to dig a large ditch which the patio falls towards and then I built a shed above it, so the water runs under and the ditch is hidden.

Anyway, interested to hear other recommendations for white pointing /,jointing ideas. Cheers, Trevor.

[seanandruby]

He probably used Geofix which was all singing all dancing when it first came on the market, it is now commonly known on this site as Geoshite because of the failure rate. There are better products out there now.
one of the pages on jointing
There are a lot of pages on jointing read the one on polymerics.

[Tony McC]

The best way to achieve the white jointing is to rely on an outdoor-grade tile jointing product, which are now commonly used with porcelain/ceramic/vitrified paving.

There are, as Sean pointed out, light-hued resin mortars, but because these are permeable, they can darken quite quickly, whereas the impermeable cement-based tile jointing materials are that bit more resistant.

However, they do require excruciating care when applying. You have to be clean and thorough or they can stick to the flag/tile surface and then they're there for good.


Fixing the loose flags is a whole separate challenge - there's a FAQ here that may help.