Quality Tile Installation

dreedfowler • February 5, 2022
Before

A great tile entryway is a wonderful way to make a great first impression.  A high-quality tile floor installation is also very durable and can last as long as 50 years.  However, a poor tile installation will fail to cracking and other issues in a short period of time.  Often, these problems occur when an installer doesn’t understand how to properly navigate the subfloor. 

This beautiful entry is an example of a botched subfloor by the installer.  The installer removed the 2” mud floor that had properly been in place when removing the original, uncracked tile.  He replaced it with 2×4 sleepers over the subfloor and then installed ½” OSB subfloor before installing the backerboard and tile.  When using this technique, we don’t want the subfloor placed on top of sleepers to be “spongy”.  Its important that the floor is solid without a lot of movement.  Because the sleepers were placed on 16” centers and used a thin ½” OSB there was too much movement.  As a result, the tile cracked. 

We corrected the issue by removing the ½” OSB, and 2×4 sleepers to get back to the original sub-floor. Then we installed 1” sleepers on 16” centers, and went over that with 3/4” tongue and groove plywood, properly glued and screwed, then we used thin set to attached the backerboard and taped the seams.

After

When replacing a tile installation that has cracking, it is imperative that the foundation is addressed.  In the case of this job had we simply removed the cracked tile and laid new tile the cracking would have returned.  Inexperienced installers often miss this issue or incorrectly reset the subfloor. 

The tile in this project was not cheap.  It was large.  It was heavy.  It required a solid foundation.  We gave it a solid foundation to sit on for years to come without cracking. The final product is a beautifully laid Akoya Ocean Krystal floor.

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