Your stone is full of polish. What product/process did they use? Have them scrub it out then apply Tenax Pectro. It should look fine.

I just got off the phone with a guy who wants his granite re-shined. I'm going to do a small section for his approval. If he likes it, we know how long it will take and how much the bill is going to be. If he doesn't, I leave, no charge.

Thank you very much, Joseph, for your answer. Unfortunately we trusted the guy, no sampling before, he came highly recommended. And we did about 120 sq ft of granite already :(. What do you think about the "wrinkled" surface? is this how it is supposed to look? The guy insisted on the fact that it is a cheaper granite, and this is the best that we can get (?) but there is no way it looked like that before he started, it had no chips, no scratches, no "wrinkles", just a little bit dull, it was in a pretty good condition. Please let me know if you think the surface looks ok, to me it doesn't and when compared to the edges it is totally different now. The beauty and clarity of the stone seems lost. Thanks a lot.

"and would protect them for longer."

Granite is an igneous rock does not have to be sealed. It's probably about 2,000,000,000 years old. You should have left it alone. It's a natural substance.

Having said that, I think it's the polishing compound - maybe there's a way to get it out of all the little voids and fissures?

I wouldn't use any sealer.

"Granite is an igneous rock does not have to be sealed."

Granite varies in porosity and certain stones will not perform well without sealing; their age is irrelevant. Most commercial stones have resin vacuumed through them at the factory and will still accept sealer.

Thank you a lot, Geoffrey. That what we thought, too. We requested them to live the stone like it is and polish it in its natural state, but they insisted on doing crystallization for a better look :( And it is a lot worse now than before :(

The deal is if the granite absorbs water (say after 10 minutes) then it will absorb a sealer. If it doesn't absorb water it doesn't need to be sealed.

Joseph, we wanted them to just seal the granite but not crystallize it (I believe these are two different steps in the process). We did not imagine the outcome would be so bad. I will get more info regarding process/product they used (if possible).

Somebody glopped on a topical film forming coating rather than an impregnating sealer. They need to remove it.

Why do 'people' want to add all sorts of sealers / topical products? The reason is that they make money selling them. I would venture a guess that 80% of the 'granite' does not need any kind of sealer.

geoffrey_b:

Your guess would be wrong.

Hi Joseph, do you think, from your professional experience that it is going to take more time now to polish the stone because of the situation created with the polish residue? Or the product that you recommended helps a lot the process and it is about the same?

The polish appears to be fine. As I stated previously, the polish residue needs to be removed then the micro-fissures filled with the Tenax. The Italians have been doing this for eons. They've got this, trust me.

How do you remove the polish residue??? Thanks a lot for your answer.

I am afraid that, because they insisted on doing crystallization, this might be a chemical reaction of the granite with the product they applied for that. I hope not. Thank you very much for your advice, Joseph.

It just needs to be stripped of whatever polyurethane or other unsuitable surface treatment that they put on it. Try a rag with some acetone and see if it does any good. You need to know specifically what they used in order to do the job right though.

I think the mica and other softer minerals might have been abraded, causing flaking. There's a geologist in the Kitchens forum, karin_mt, and she has an ongoing thread about the geology of countertops. I'd ask her opinion. Her thread, Countertop Geology, is on the first page right now.