Sealing besser block · Perth
Cement block walls, sealed to stay clean.
Besser block is cement, and cement is exactly what our coating was built to grip. MineralProtect is the one and only next-generation sol-gel surface coating in Australia, and it bonds into the block itself, breathable and colourless, so the white bloom, the green and black film and the staining stop setting into an open, thirsty wall. Not a paint or a film on top waiting to blush and peel.
What goes wrong with block walls
A bare block wall drinks everything in.
A cement masonry block is a porous, thirsty thing, and a boundary wall, retaining wall or block fence is a big vertical face of it left open to the weather. Rain runs down it, sprinklers hit it, bore water spots it and moisture wicks through it, and that open surface is where every common block-wall problem starts. Most walls are left raw or bagged, and the ones that get painted often blush and peel within a few Perth summers.
The white bloom
Efflorescence
Moisture wicks lime and salt out of the block, carries it to the face, and it dries as a chalky white haze streaking down the wall. It is the block purging itself. The instant someone rolls a film-forming sealer or paint over it, that moisture gets trapped and the whitening cures under the coating, where you cannot scrub it off.
Green and black
Going green in the shade
Shaded and south-facing block walls go green and black because an open, damp surface is a perfect bed for mould, algae and lichen. Bare block holds the water and grime they feed on, so it fouls fast, and the growth digs into the pore where a hose alone will not reach.
The dark patches
Water marks and staining
Reticulation overspray, bore water iron and general dirt soak straight into an open block face and mark it. Water darkens patches unevenly, mineral spotting sets in, and grime builds in the porous surface until the whole wall looks tired and blotchy.
The paint that failed
A film that blushes and peels
A block wall is often painted or coated to tidy it up. That is a film sitting on top, and outdoors in Perth it chalks, blushes milky where moisture is trapped behind it, and lifts off the block, then has to be stripped back before you can start again. Each round costs more than the last.
How our coating works
It doesn't sit on the block. It bonds in.
The category only ever had two ways to seal: a film on top, or a sealer soaked down into the pores. Both wear out in Perth and put you on a repeat cycle. MineralProtect is a third way, and cement block is a surface it grips strongly, because the cement gives it a genuine chemical hold at the face.
Bonds into the block itself
Cement paste and the block's sand carry reactive silanol groups, and our water-based sol-gel cures into them as a dense inorganic Si-O-Si network right at the surface. That is a real chemical bond into the block, roughly 90 to 100 nanometres thin, colourless, not a film stuck on the face waiting to lift.
Protects where the weather hits
The protection sits at the surface, exactly where rain, sprinklers, sun and cleaning land, not buried down the pore out of reach. A pore sealer builds its repellency millimetres inside the block, in the wrong place for a wall face, so the surface you actually look at and wash meets effectively bare block.
And it still breathes
Because it works at the surface instead of capping the pores, moisture and the lime behind efflorescence can still get out. That is the whole difference: a breathable seal lets the block purge harmlessly, while a film or paint traps the moisture and turns the bloom into a white haze that blushes under the coating.
Where we actually win
Built for how a wall gets weathered.
A block wall is not a lab sample. It gets pressure-washed, baked under UV, streaked with sprinkler water, hit with cleaner and dripped on, and every one of those loads acts at the surface. That is exactly where our coating lives, and it is why a pore sealer, with its protection stranded down the pore, cannot keep up on the face you actually see.
Cleaning & abrasion
Survives the pressure wash
The dense inorganic network sits right where the brush and the pressure washer act, so it keeps working through the cleaning that wears ordinary sealers off a wall face. It fades slowly and predictably, and renews with a top-up on a clean block rather than a strip.
Chemical
Designed for cleaning, not just water
The bonded inorganic surface stays stable through the alkaline detergents and pressure washing of real maintenance, the same exposure that hydrolyses a pore sealer's anchor and makes it fail from inside. More resistant, not immune, and honest about it.
UV
Won't yellow or chalk
Sun is what breaks most coatings down, and a west-facing block wall cops it all day. Our surface is inorganic, so it does not yellow or chalk the way an organic paint or acrylic film does, and it holds up under the Perth UV that ages other coatings well before their time.
Oil & grime
Dirt lifts instead of soaking in
Oily grime, exhaust film near a driveway and general dirt sit on the surface and lift in cleaning instead of soaking into the pore, so a wash brings the wall back rather than leaving a shadow behind. A water-repellent-only sealer leaves the block open to the very contaminants that mark it.
The one line that matters: we protect against the real-world weathering of the wall, cleaning, chemicals, UV and grime, because our protection is at the surface where that weather happens. A pore sealer's protection is down the pore, where none of it usefully reaches.
Proven, not promised
One price. One coat. On the record.
We seal masonry across Perth metro at one all-in rate, with the coating that bonds into the surface, and we register the result. No itemised extras, no surprise on the day.
- $16 per square metre, all-in. Full preparation clean, MineralProtect applied by certified applicators, and your guarantee registered. The clean is never sold separately.
- Built to survive the weather. The bonded surface holds up under the UV, alkaline cleaners and pressure washing that break down ordinary paints and pore sealers, invisibly, then all at once.
- Independently tested chemistry. The JUMBOGUARD system is tested at independent houses including TÜV Rheinland, SGS, Intertek and to REACH. On glass, GlassProtect is still beading past 3,000 scrub cycles.
Straight about the limits
What sealing won't do.
We would rather tell you the truth before you book than have you expecting magic. Cement block is a strong fit for our coating, and here is where the honest line sits.
It is a face seal, not a waterproofing job
We seal the exposed face of the wall. That changes how rain, sprinklers and dirt behave on the front, but it cannot hold back ground water or salt pushing through from the soil side of a retaining wall. If your wall is wet from the back, that is a drainage and waterproofing job behind the blocks, and we will tell you so plainly.
It won't stop the block making efflorescence
The lime and salt come from inside the block, so no coating stops them forming. What ours does is stay breathable and keep the surface repellent, so the bloom completes and washes off rather than curing under a film. That is the honest, and better, outcome than trapping it behind paint.
The beading fades before the protection does
The visible water-beading eases off before the coating has stopped working, so treat losing the bead as a prompt to book a top-up, not proof of failure. The coating renews on a clean wall without stripping, and there is no cliff-edge where it all lets go at once.
The questions we actually get
Block walls, answered.
Will sealing stop the white efflorescence on my wall?
Efflorescence is salt and lime carried out of the block itself by moisture, so no coating stops it being produced. What our seal does is stay breathable and keep the surface repellent, so the bloom completes and washes off the face instead of setting. The worst thing you can do to an efflorescing block wall is roll a film-forming sealer or paint over it, because that traps the moisture and whitens under the coating where you cannot reach it.
Can you seal a retaining wall, and will it stop water coming through?
We seal the exposed face, and that is an honest boundary worth setting. A face seal changes how rain, sprinklers and dirt behave on the front of the wall. It cannot hold back ground water or salt pushing through from the soil side of a retaining wall, because that is a drainage and waterproofing job behind the blocks, not a surface job on the front. If your wall is wet from the back, we will tell you straight that a face coating is not the fix.
My besser wall has gone green and black in the shade. Can you clean and seal it?
Yes, and we clean first, always. A shaded block wall goes green and black because an open, damp, porous surface is a perfect bed for mould, algae and lichen. We strip that growth back to a sound, clean block, then seal. A sealed face holds less water and grime, so it is slower to green up again and far easier to wash down when it does.
Will sealing change the colour or look of the blocks?
No. MineralProtect is colourless and non-pigmenting. Grey stays grey, and the texture stays exactly as it is. It changes the surface energy of the block, not the look, so the only difference you see is that water and dirt no longer grip. If you want a wet-look or a darker tone, that is a different product and not what we apply as standard, so tell us first.
Do you seal painted or rendered besser block?
We seal raw and bagged masonry, where the coating can bond into the mineral surface of the block. Painted block is a different situation, because you have a film of paint on top and our coating is built to grip the block, not the paint. If the paint is failing we can talk through options when we quote, but the ideal is a sound, unpainted masonry face.
How long does it last, and do you have to strip it to redo it?
Two clocks, kept separate on purpose. One coat of MineralProtect performs for years on a wall depending on exposure, and it tops up on a clean surface with no stripping and no cliff-edge failure. The guarantee is a 10-year registered guarantee covering the sealed system performing as described, and it sits on top of your Australian Consumer Law rights.
Related surfaces
More in the brick & masonry family.
Clay brick / face brick
Face brickwork and the efflorescence and grime that build in an open masonry surface. Read the guide
Clay / brick pavers
Brick paver driveways, paths and courtyards, sealed the breathable way. Read the guide
Terracotta / quarry tile
Unglazed, breathable clay tile that needs a seal that does not trap moisture. Read the guide
Roof tiles (concrete / clay)
Porous roof tiles going mossy and grey, and the honest limit of a face seal. Read the guide
Get a quote
Seal your block wall once.
We will prepare and seal your cement block wall with MineralProtect, the coating that bonds into the surface, registered under a 10-year guarantee. Confirmed price before you book.