Dry time

SEK-Surebond's Technical Bulletin TB17 puts a 24 hour figure on each side of one application. A surface wet with standing water from rain or cleaning should dry approximately 24 hours before a sealer goes on, depending on project conditions, and once the sealer is applied the surface needs to remain dry for 24 hours. ICPI's Tech Spec 5 states the first half for most sealers: the cleaned surface must be completely dry, with at least 24 hours without moisture or surface dampness before application.

The wait before is about the paver, and the moisture still in it when the sealer arrives. The wait after is about the sealer, which TB17 says can turn cloudy or blotchy if rain comes too soon after application. Why a surface can look dry and still hold too much water is answered on pavers that look dry but are still too wet to seal, and what a shower does to the count before sealing on whether rain restarts the clock before sealing.

SEK-Surebond's site preparation bulletin, TB.6, carries the before-application wait too, and it is quoted step by step under the numbered steps in SEK-Surebond's TB.6.

After application, dry to the touch is the first point on a maker's table, not the last. SEK-Surebond's SB-1300 is dry to the touch by 60 minutes, assuming 65 to 85 F at 50 percent relative humidity, and its sheet says low temperature or high relative humidity extends dry times. Seal 'n Lock's Super-Wet-Look normally dries in sunny areas in approximately 1 hour, and its guide says shade, lower temperature or high humidity slow that. Neither figure is cure time, the later span while the chemistry finishes bonding.

The ASCC guide, written about decorative concrete rather than pavers, gives the same order at an ambient 70 F: typically dry to the touch in 1 to 2 hours and ready for light foot traffic in 3 to 4.

Whether any sealer is made to go on damp pavers right after a cleaning is answered on sealers labeled for damp pavers, and how a cool night in the Naples normals sits against a label's limits on sealing pavers in winter in Naples.