Staining stone veneer - any suggestions?

[mikeathens]

After my internet search (no phone calls, yet), I've found that most people want to REMOVE stains from their cultured stone veneer.

After looking for a LOOOOONG time, I found aobut 90 SF of "limestone" colored stone veneer on craigslist for about $1.60/SF. Not the ideal color, but cheaper than the $450 I would have had to spend buying from a dealer. I wanted this stuff to put around my ugly-a$$ concrete block front porch on an otherwise visually appealing 1870's log cabin. As it stands, it would probably look nice, but wouldn't match the old hand-cut sandstone (brown) foundation blocks under the house.

I have found "acid stains", but way too much work and way too expensive. Any ideas on how to turn "grey" into an approximation of the brown sandstone for cheap (yes, I am cheap)?

I've had a few sinister ideas:

1. Lightly spray and then hose off some walnut colored Wood Guard that I used on my house. This is a wicked oil-based wood stain, for those not familiar. Commonly used on log homes.

2. Wait until fall, and do my normal collection of black walnuts. Except instead of tossing out the nasty brown water that I use to rinse the walnuts off, instead spray it on the veneer!

Not sure aobut either of these ideas, but there always seems to be a lot of good ideas floating around here. So, what do you all think?

Picture shows the nasty concrete block porch and sandstone foundation...

 

[dvellone]

There are masonry stains on the market. If the cultured stone is fairly absorbent I'd think they would work just fine. Do a search on masonry stains, get some and test a sample stone with it.

 

[mayhem]

Home Depot tile section? Cement a rough finish made of actual stone right on there.

PS, whats that thing onthe back of the house that looks like swimming pool filter? Rainwater collection?

 

[mikeathens]

Mayhem,

Not quite sure what you're talking about...I have a stone veneer already that I picked up for cheap. Just wanting to tweak the color a bit.

The swimming pool filter thing is my "first flush diverter" of sorts. It is sitting directly over the 4500 gallon cisten that we rely on each summer for water. It fills with about 30 gallons of water, then the water backs up in the pipe and it runs through a tee, into the cistern. I rigged it up with a $10 trash can and about $20 in 4" PVC pipe. Drians slowly through a small hole between rains. Just gotta be careful the hole doesn't clog (PVC like to explode when water freezes inside of it).

 

[mayhem]

Gotcha, poor reading comprehension. I thoguht you were going to try to stain the raw cement to look like cultured stone. Now that I'm saying it out loud (well, typing it) it doesn't sound right.