Professional Installation Of Tiles

2023 Author: Douglas Hoggarth | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-05-24 11:23

Today we will describe an important step in creating a high-quality ceramic coating - the laying process. After all, it is obvious to an amateur that even the most expensive tile, carelessly laid on the walls or floor, will look more than modest.

The work on laying ceramic tiles begins with preparatory activities. To find out how many tiles and other auxiliary materials you will have to buy, you need to measure the facing areas. To carry out this operation, you will need: an ordinary tape measure and utmost attention.

Measuring the dimensions of the wall, the master applies a tape measure strictly along the vertical and horizontal axes and calculates the result on paper. When taking the dimensions of the floor, the first thing to check is the corners of the room. If they are unequal, it is necessary to foresee in advance the correct arrangement of tiles that are incomplete in size at the points of abutment to walls or other structural elements of the room. The correctness of the shape and size of the sides of the room is checked by measuring the diagonal of the room with a tape measure. If the length of the diagonals is the same, then the corners of the room are straight and the sides are mutually perpendicular.

Having carried out all the measurements and fixing the result on paper, it is important to remember that after processing the surfaces, the numbers will change slightly. So, when dismantling the old tile, they slightly increase, and when plastering, they decrease.

Without letting go of the pencil and paper, we proceed to develop a tile laying scheme. For this, plans of all surfaces to be clad are drawn on a sheet, separately and in an isometric projection. Be sure to mark all openings, devices and structures. Then choose the type of cladding: seam in seam, in staggered or diagonal. At the same stage, the size of the tiles, the presence of decorative elements, borders and friezes are determined.

With the help of a pencil and a ruler, the arrangement of the tiles is drawn on the surface plans. The position of the decors, borders and friezes is noted. At the same time, it is necessary to strive to ensure that there are no narrow strips of tiles in the corners and other places of abutment of different planes. Several layouts can be prepared for tiles of different sizes. With the help of two plans, it is easy to calculate how many tiles, borders and decors to buy.

SURFACE PREPARATION

The next stage of preliminary work is the preparation of the facing surfaces. The service life of the ceramic coating largely depends on how carefully the walls or floor will be prepared for cladding. To check the readiness of the floors for facing, a level is required, and to check the walls, either a level with 2 eyes or a plumb line.

It will be necessary to identify several surface parameters that affect the amount of preparatory work, the amount of materials required for preparation and facing, as well as the quality of the facing. First, they look at the deviation of the surfaces from the axes or from the given planes. For floors, as a rule, from the horizontal, and for walls - from the vertical. To check the floor, a long rule is laid on it in several directions. An air bubble in the lens will show how much the floor is tilted. If you want to make a floor with a given slope, then a template rail is placed under the level, in which a profile corresponding to the slope is made. A deviation of 2 mm per meter of rule length (0.2%) is permissible, but not more than 50 mm for room dimensions of more than 25 m.

To check the deviation of walls from the vertical axis, there are two measurement methods: using a plumb line and using a level. When using a plumb line, the error is less. To use a plumb line, nails are driven in at the corners of the walls under the ceiling, or marks are installed to attach a plaster or alabaster plumb line. Then a plumb line is hung on these marks. Using a tape measure or ruler, the gap between the plumb line and the wall is checked in several places along the entire height. If the check is done with a level, then the technology is similar to checking the floor, only you need to look at the other peephole of the level. A wall slope of 0.2% is allowed, that is, the difference between the gap under the ceiling and at the floor does not exceed 2 mm per meter of height.

The second operation for evaluating surfaces is checking the flatness of the planes. This is done using a long level, a rule or an even bar. The selected tool is applied to the surface to be tested. The gaps between it and the surface of the underlying cladding should not be more than 2 mm. If there are more irregularities, then they have to be eliminated.

The strength of the surfaces is checked by tapping. If there are poorly adhered layers, a booming sound will be heard. Such layers will need to be scraped off to a solid brick or concrete base. If, when checking by tapping, the surface crumbles like sand, then it can be strengthened with special means or removed.

If the walls of the room are wooden, they must be upholstered with a metal mesh with a mesh size of 10-15 mm before facing with ceramic tiles. The metal mesh is not nailed directly onto a wooden wall, but onto wooden blocks 20-25 mm thick and 30-40 mm wide. Between these slats and the surface of the wooden wall, a layer of roofing or roofing felt is preliminarily laid. The metal mesh is coated with cement mortar with the addition of fibrous substances (grade 6-7 asbestos, strips), after which this surface is plastered with cement mortar 1: 3. The thickness of the plaster layer must be at least 15 mm. When preparing surfaces for cladding, plaster is performed without smoothing and grouting the plaque. When laying tiles on wooden floors, they must first be upholstered with steel mesh, then a screed should be laid on the mesh - a layer of concrete 2-3 cm thick,then put another layer of metal mesh and another layer of concrete of the same thickness as the first. After that, the resulting surface should be carefully leveled and scratched (grooved) on it for better adhesion of the solution, on which the ceramic tiles will then be laid, with the floor. After the concrete has set (after 3-5 days), you can start laying the floor.

Wall cladding with ceramic tiles is carried out on leveled surfaces, cleaned of dirt, solution washings and grease stains. Despite the fact that today there is a wide variety of adhesive mixtures that allow facing directly on the old tile, it is better to remove the old tile. It is worth refusing to clean old tiles only if there is a strong lack of time, and only on the condition that the surfaces are perfectly smooth. Dismantling old tiles is done with a hammer and chisel. Then the wall is cleaned with a spatula from the remnants of glue or solution. If the tile was previously laid on the painted surface, then it will be further cleaned.

If the wall faced with ceramic tiles has been painted, the paint layer must be completely cleaned off, again regardless of the availability of adhesive mixtures on sale, which are intended for laying tiles on painted surfaces. Experience shows that reliable adhesion of paint to the base is a huge rarity. If this is not done, the initially well-adhered tile, after a while, will gradually begin to move away from the wall together with the cement mortar, rise up like a "fur coat" and, eventually, fall off. It is convenient to knock down paint from strong surfaces with a punch with a spatula. The operating speed is very high, but a lot of noise. You can also peel off the paint using a cutting machine with a card brush attachment. If it is not possible to mechanize the work, then the paint gets off well with a hatchet. Loose layers of paint can be cleaned off with a spatula or cycles.

But one cannot be limited to cleaning the wall from paint. If you want the tiles to stick well to the wall, you need to dilute clean cement with water to the consistency of liquid sour cream and, immersing a small piece of rag in the resulting mixture, grip one end of it in your hand, and apply a thin layer of cement to the wall with the other. The rag should leave a cement spot with a thickness of no more than 2-3 mm in contact with the wall surface. Thus, you need to prime the entire wall surface with clean cement, which will be tiled. Tiles on such a wall can only be laid after it is completely dry.

Walls covered with wallpaper also need to be cleaned. To do this, moisten the wallpaper with hot water and arm yourself with a spatula. Unlike the previous ones, this operation is very simple. After the elimination of paper canvases, the wall is additionally cleaned with a card brush from the remnants of wallpaper glue. If not the entire wall is to be lined, then the wallpaper is removed from the area, which is slightly smaller than it will be covered with tiles. With extreme care, the tile is glued so that it goes a little on the wallpaper.

And finally, the floor. If it is covered with linoleum or PVC tiles, they will have to be removed. If the flooring is simply laid on the floor, then the plinths that held it are raised, and the linoleum itself is rolled. If it is glued, then pry the edge of the sheet with a spatula and gently rip it off. Then, using a card brush or coarse sandpaper, remove the remnants of the glue.

Having prepared the surface for the start of work, you need to take care of the ceramic tiles. For better adhesion of tiles with mortar, before starting work, they should be soaked for a while in water so that their surface is under water. The exact time required for the process of saturating the tiles with moisture is difficult to name. If after a while (10-20 minutes) you take the tile out of the water and, holding it to your ear, hear a characteristic slight hiss, this means that the water has not yet displaced all the air from the tile and soaking should be continued. When the hissing stops, the tile is saturated with moisture and can be installed on the wall.

It should be borne in mind that watery stains may remain under the enamel of some types of tiles if they are abundantly wetted with water. Such tiles should not be soaked; they should be soaked on the inside with a wet brush. Even better, before laying such a tile, apply a little liquefied cement mortar to its back side and immediately clean it off with the edge of a trowel so that there is no sharp redistribution of moisture, and the tile does not fall off after laying.

If you have a choice, it is better to start with ceramic tiles from the floor, as in this case the tiles laid on the wall will rest on the floors laid horizontally. If the walls need to be decorated earlier than the floors, then at the bottom of each wall you will have to install a rail on which the lower rows of tiles will rest.

FLOOR COVERING

Before laying ceramic tiles on the floor, it will not be superfluous to check the accuracy of the installation scheme. To do this, you need to expand two perpendicular rows along the axes. In this case, crosses are inserted between the tiles in order to take into account the distance between the seams.

When laying tiles directly, a place is chosen for the first row. If uncut tiles are laid along the walls, then it is more convenient to start from the end of the room opposite the entrance. Otherwise, you can start either from the middle of the room (on large areas) or from the second row from the wall (on small areas). When laying diagonally with a frieze, work always begins with marking the frieze. Its length should be such that an integer number of triangular tiles can be laid around its perimeter. You should start with laying the main field, and it will be bordered later with a frieze and embedding.

Then, using a square and a level, the so-called lighthouse tiles are installed. They are necessary to maintain the plane and level of coverage. If there are bumps on the plane, then the beacons are placed at the highest rise. An adhesive mixture is applied to the floor in the places where the beacons are installed, which is leveled with a notched trowel. Then the tiles are laid directly and tapped with a rubber mallet. A short level checks the correct installation of the tile along its axes and diagonals. Then the next beacon is installed, but its position is still checked with a long level in relation to the previous beacon. If the tile is curved, then the gaps between it and the level should be symmetrical about the middle of the tile. Between the lighthouse marks along the entire contour of the room along a cord and using a rail called a rule, flour rows are laid,then intermediate marks and lighthouse rows are installed in the central part of the floor. The tiles are laid along a cord, fixed horizontally on pins, nails or dowels, hammered near the lighthouse rows. To increase the adhesion strength of ceramic tiles with the mortar and to facilitate the work with it, plasticizers are added to the cement mortar - lime or clay. With them, the solution becomes more plastic, not so rough. The amount of plasticizer is selected in a trial manner.not so rude. The amount of plasticizer is selected in a trial manner.not so rude. The amount of plasticizer is selected in a trial manner.

The black floor of the room is completely covered with a layer of cement mortar, 10-15 mm thick. The width of the joints between tiles up to 200x200 mm in size should be no more than 2 mm. The tiles are laid on the prepared cement mortar and settled by blows with a trowel or trowel handle to the level of the cord stretched along the lighthouse rows.

When the row is completely finished, then check the level of its plane. There should be no swings on the bumps and gaps between him and the tile. If the work started from the second row from the wall, then the first row is laid with pruning. If the first row was the initial one, then two or three subsequent rows are laid - the so-called captures. The grippers are limited on one side by the previous row of tiles, and on the other by a stretched cord.

Glue is applied to the surface that can be veneered in 10-15 minutes. It is leveled with a comb and tiles are laid. The finishing material is leveled with a rubber mallet in height, if the tile is recessed in relation to the neighboring ones, it will have to be removed and cement mortar added. After alignment in height and plane, the tiles are oriented and seams are formed using crosses. The crosses must be sunk into at least half the thickness of the tile. Lightly tapping from the end of the tile is slightly compacted. Constantly check the coincidence of the edge of the tile in the last row of the grip with a stretched thread

When installing ceramic tiles on the floor, besides the fact that they are laid at the level of a horizontally stretched cord, the correctness of their laying is checked by the rule. A level is placed on top of the rule in order to reveal all deviations in the position of the ceramic tiles, and, therefore, the floor as a whole. In addition to checking for horizontalness, the rule also serves to check for unevenness, because the stretched cord that bounds the upper plane of the laid ceramic tile is a rather shaky border. And the eye may not notice that in one place the tile lay 0.5 mm lower than the stretched cord, and the tile adjacent to it slightly raised this cord with its surface, as a result of which the difference in height between adjacent tiles can reach 3 mm. It's not very pleasant to walk on such an uneven floor.

Pay attention to the corners of the tiles. If the tile has different concavities, they may protrude. In this case, some tiles can be upset slightly below the required level, and the floor will appear smoother. The seams must be cleaned of glue with a wooden stick or a damp sponge. After completing the row, remove excess glue from the edge of the tile. Pull on the cord again, and make the next row. In small rooms, you can do without a cord; in this case, the straightness of the seams is controlled using a long level, which is applied to the end of the row. When laying diagonally, the cord is stretched for each row. In this case, it is imperative to monitor the coincidence of the seams in two perpendicular directions. As you progress, the lighthouse tiles are removed, cleaned and used for installation.

Between the walls of the room, both in length and in width, a whole number of ceramic tiles does not always fit, and they have to be cut. Not only is it difficult to smoothly cut ceramic tiles intended for flooring, it leads to overspending of tiles and takes a lot of time and effort. Especially many wall tiles have to be cut with a symmetrical tile laying system, when the first tile is laid in the center of the floor. With an asymmetrical flooring system, tiles are started from one corner towards two opposite walls. In this case, you only need to cut through the tiles adjacent to the two walls, at which we are finishing the lining process. If a whole number of tiles are laid along the wall and there is still a small space, you can do without cutting the tiles,simply by slightly enlarging the joints between the tiles so that the extra width of the joints absorbs the missing space.

MASTICS FOR FLOOR TILES

Often, ceramic floor tiles are not laid on cement mortar or dry glue, but on bituminous mastics. Experts say that mastics for laying tiles (for example, Mastic for gluing tiles, PS-5, Gumilax, Sintalaks, Akrilax, Germelax) and adhesives (Bustilat, Stylit "etc.) more reliably hold ceramic items on the floor. Therefore, it will not be superfluous to talk about the composition of these adhesives and how to work with them.

Composition of bituminous mastics for gluing ceramic tiles:

1. Bituminous-silicate. (Clay-bitumen paste - 1 part, liquid glass - 3/4, chalk - 2.) Clay-bitumen paste is prepared from BN-II or BN-III bitumen - 36%, fatty clay - 24%, water - 40%.

2. Cold lime-bitumen. (BN 2/11 bitumen - 1 part, lime dough - 0.8 parts, water - 0.6 parts.) It is prepared with heating bitumen to 160-180 ° C, lime dough and water - up to 60-80 ° C. The mixture is stirred for 5-10 minutes.

The mastics are applied to the primed surfaces with a thin layer - no more than 2-3 mm. The tiles are laid on the mastic, tapping on their surface for a better fit so that the seams between the tiles are minimal (no more than 2 mm). The excess mastic squeezed out by the tiles is removed with a steel spatula, and the remnants of the mastic are washed off with a solvent. The procedure for laying tiles on bituminous mastics is the same as when laying tiles on cement mortar.

However, the floors must be cleaned and leveled before laying ceramic tiles. If the floor is wooden, it is leveled with wood fillers, concrete floors are leveled with cement mortar. This solution is prepared by gradually adding water to dry cement, stirring constantly until a thick paste is formed. In some cases, when the floor is very porous, it must be primed. The composition of the primer depends on the type of glue or mastic you are going to use when laying the tiles. So, if you use Bustilat glue for flooring, the floor should be primed in advance with a 15% solution of this glue in water. Then a layer of glue is applied to the dried primed surface and ceramic tiles are laid on it, carefully pressing it to the primed floor surface. In this case, walking on the floor is only possible in a day.

Mastics "Sintalaks", "Gumilaks", "Germelaks" and "Akrilaks", after mixing well, are applied with a spatula on a carefully swept dry floor (concrete, wood) with a layer of 1.5-2 mm, after which they immediately begin laying ceramic tiles. You can walk on the floor after three days. With the help of "PS-B" mastic it is possible to glue not only ceramic tiles, but also all types of linoleum. Prepare it no more than an hour and a half before use. For preparation, mix the mastic with a hardener in a ratio of 10: 1, after which it is applied to the floor surface with a spatula and ceramic tiles are attached to it, slightly pressing them. You can walk on the floor no earlier than two days later. "Mastic for gluing tiles" perfectly glues all facing materials for floors, including ceramic tiles,however, it is not waterproof enough. To increase the water resistance of the composition, an organosilicon compound is introduced into it before application.

The consumption of all the listed adhesives and mastics on the covering of 1 m2 of floor is from 0.5 to 0.9 kg. You can clean the tool and hands, remove excess glue while it has not yet dried, you can use water when using "Bustilat", "Mastic for gluing tiles", "Syntalax", "Gumilax", "Germelax", "Akrilax" mastics. When using "PS-B" mastic, excess mastic is removed in the old fashioned way with acetone, alcohol or kerosene. They also wash hands and tools.

WALL COVERING

Now that the floor is ready, you can start tiling the walls. Tilers recommend starting from the front wall, from the one opposite the entrance to the room. When the rest of the walls are tiled, all the unevenness resulting from the cutting of the tiles on the front wall will be hidden under the mortar and tiles of the side walls. And the irregularities on the side walls are not so noticeable when entering the room.

Tiles can be laid on the wall in three ways: "seam in seam", "in bandage" and diagonally. In seam-to-seam facing, the tiles form rows in both horizontal and vertical directions. Vertical seams are located strictly along the plumb line, and horizontal seams - along the level. But when installing tiles in the "seam in seam" method, it is desirable either to have tiles with a very small range of sizes, that is, almost the same, or to sort out the tiles and put them into packs of the same sizes.

However, it is better for an inexperienced master not to get involved in the bulkhead of tiles. This activity can lead to very sad consequences. Judge for yourself, you measured the tiles, laid them out in stacks in strict accordance with their size and began to cover the wall. As you get carried away by placing tiles on a wall from top to bottom, you will most likely take tiles for one row of only one size - from the same stack. It would seem that everything is correct, it was not for nothing that they were laid out. But … on one wall you use all the tiles of a smaller size, and on the facing of the next one there will be well-sorted slabs, but obviously more by 1-1.5 mm. Now, starting to lay the very first row of the next, adjacent to the newly laid wall, we immediately get that the seam of the next row, the second, will be exactly these 1-1.5 mm higher than on the previous wall. And every next onethe higher row will be higher not by 1-1.5 mm, but by 2-3 mm. And you can't change anything. Therefore, it is better not to tempt fate and do not bulk up the tiles by size.

When facing the walls with tiles "in bandaging", each tile of the higher row is placed in such a way that its middle is exactly above the seam separating the tiles of the lower row. Installation of ceramic tiles "in bandaging" can be carried out only in horizontal rows, and when installing "seam in seam" - horizontal and vertical. But it is much easier to put the tiles in the "bandaging" method, the horizontal seam turns out as if by itself. In addition, in this case, some difference in the size of the tiles does not matter, and ceramic tiles do not have absolutely exact dimensions.

The third way of laying is diagonally. It is equal to the first two, but more often it is used when facing large areas. When facing diagonally, the seams between the tiles form perpendicular lines, but intersect the wall abutment lines at an angle of 45 degrees. This is the most difficult and time consuming cladding method. It requires a lot of well-calibrated tiles. The entire facing surface is divided into individual squares or rectangles, separated by rows of tiles placed straight, that is, as usual, when facing "seam in seam" or "in bandage". The space of the marked squares and rectangles is covered with tiles placed diagonally on one of the vertices. In this case, the size of the marked figures must be a multiple of the diagonal sizes of the tiles.

INSTALLATION TECHNOLOGY

Wall cladding, like the floor, begins with the installation of lighthouse tiles, which are set horizontally and vertically along a plumb line. To prevent the lighthouse tiles from slipping, it is better to install them on alabaster, which hardens many times faster than cement mortar. In the process of facing the wall, reaching the row where the lighthouse tiles are installed, they are removed, cleaned of frozen alabaster and installed back, but already on cement mortar.

After installing the lighthouse tiles, horizontal rows of laying the tiles are outlined, determining the number of rows by dividing the height of the surface to be faced by the size of the tile, taking into account the joint thickness of 1-3 mm. If a whole number of tiles do not fit, the bottom row must be made of non-dimensional tiles, that is, tiles, some of which have been cut off. This is done because at the top such a row is always striking, but at the bottom it remains invisible.

Lighthouse tiles are installed at the very bottom and at the very top of the facing surface, but at a distance of no more than 2 m from each other. In rooms where the surfaces to be faced are small, it is sufficient to place 4 lighthouse tiles on each wall, placing them one in each corner (see figure).

Laying tiles begins from the bottom up. If the floors have recently been laid or laid by yourself, then, of course, you can be sure that their plane is strictly horizontal, and you can really start laying the tiles, resting the tiles of the lowest row on the floor. Otherwise, do not be lazy to check the level of the floors using a level. But it is pointless to simply put a level on the floor surface when checking, it will show the degree of horizontalness of this particular place, and not the entire floor as a whole. For a correct check, a long, even profiled strip is placed on the floor along the wall, which compensates for all small irregularities in the floor. They set a level on this rail and … It becomes obvious that the horizontal level of the floor, to put it mildly, leaves much to be desired. And for laying the first row of tiles, you need a strictly horizontal floor surface. We'll have to use the rail with which the floor was checked to install the first row of tiles on it. To do this, they put it in the very corner, set it horizontally in level and fix it in this position so that it does not move up or down and does not bend under the weight of the tiles being laid. After the wall cladding is completed, the lath is removed and the space left after it is filled with cement mortar.the rail is removed, and the place left after it is filled with cement mortar.the rail is removed, and the place left after it is filled with cement mortar.

After installing a horizontal flattened rail at the bottom of the wall - in the corners - you need to put plumb slats, which are wooden blocks with a section of approximately 40x40 mm and a length of at least 2 m. These slats are installed along a plumb line and so that during operation they do not move from places are fixed on the wall with nails or dowels. The slats are needed to attach a horizontal guide cord to them, along which the horizontal rows of tiles will be installed. After the end of the wall cladding, the vertical slats, like the horizontal ones, are removed, and the voids remaining in their place are filled with tiles in cement mortar.

It is always difficult to lay the last tiles in a horizontal row: either the tile does not fit in the place intended for it, or, conversely, a sufficiently large gap remains between the tile and the corner. So that such difficulties do not arise after the vertical slats are torn off, when installing them, you need to make sure that they take up space sufficient for free laying with a certain gap of the last tile in the row. But imagine how much time you save in the presence of vertical slats: when moving to the next, higher row, they simply hammer in a nail into these slats and pull the mooring cord again, and the work front is ready after the bottom row is laid. And if it weren't for these convenient vertical slats, when moving to each next row of tiles, you would have to hammer dowels, crutches, etc. into the wall, or maybeand drill holes for plugs in order to then drive nails into them, onto which the mooring cord is pulled.

An insidious question may arise: why is a horizontal mooring cord needed at all? Indeed, when tiling small areas with tiles, you can, in principle, do without it, just apply approximately the same amount of cement mortar to the inside of the tile, and the tile will lie flat on the eye, without a cord. But when facing large enough areas, this method is not suitable. The fact is that the walls in our houses, as a rule, are not even. They are either covered with "waves" or curved in an arc. The walls of block houses, made in special cassette machines, repeat the shape of the machine compartment in which they were molded. And these metal compartments are bent over time from exposure to steam and temperature drops. The walls of our apartments emerge from them in exactly the same way. If the surfaces of such curved walls are lined without a horizontal cord, after the end of the work, the lined surface will exactly repeat all the defects and bends of the wall.

So let's get down to styling. Cement mortar in the form of a truncated pyramid is applied with a trowel to the back of the tile and pressed against the wall, lightly tapping the trowel's wooden handle to settle the tile to the desired level, which shows a horizontally stretched cord. In this case, it is necessary to ensure that when the tiles are settled, the solution fills the entire space under it. The voids reduce the adhesion of the tile with the cement mortar, which can subsequently render the cladding unusable. The normal thickness of the cement mortar under the tiles should be at least 7 mm and not more than 15 mm, which is provided for when installing lighthouse tiles. The adhesion of the tiles to the wall surface has nothing to do with the thickness of the grout layer underneath. Excess cement mortar squeezed from the sides of the tile is cut off with a trowel.

The width of the joints between the tiles can vary from 0.5 to 3 mm. So that the width of the joints between the tiles is the same over the entire lined surface, the same wedges are laid between the tiles as a template, having a thickness corresponding to the width of the joint. You can use metal staples of the same thickness as such wedges. After the cement mortar has hardened, they are pulled out. However, you can do without any wedges at all, if you put the tiles almost end-to-end, in this case, due to various kinds of tile protrusions and irregularities between the tiles, a gap of about 0.5 mm is still obtained by itself.

If, when facing the wall, it became necessary to lay the tiles on a thinner layer of mortar in some area, it must be made a little thinner, then it will be easier to lay the tiles. Conversely, to apply a thick layer of the solution, it is necessary that it be thicker. To liquefy the cement slurry, you just need to add water to it and mix thoroughly. In order to make the mortar thicker, adding cement to it is useless, only sand makes the cement mortar dense. But when sand is added, the ratio of parts in it changes, so a little cement should be added along with the sand, after which everything is thoroughly mixed.

LITTLE TIPS OF THE BIG MASTERS

Sometimes, when covering the surface with tiles, you can find unpleasant defects in the tiles, for example, when abundant wetting with water, stains are formed under the enamel layer, the edges of the tiles are damaged (cracks, cracks, violations of the integrity of the enamel layer) or tiles have different sizes. It is very simple to get rid of the first defect - the tiles are simply not soaked in water. It is better not to use specimens with chips, cracks, chipped enamel entirely, so as not to spoil the appearance of the lined surface. Strips must be cut out of such tiles for installation in places where the whole tile does not pass in size. A tile that is noticeably different in size from all the others can be installed somewhere below, where it is not very noticeable, by increasing or decreasing the adjacent seams. Curved (non-planar) tiles can, with practice, be used for cladding entirely,just a layer of cement mortar under it will lie unevenly - much less in the center than at the edges. Therefore, it is also better to lay it somewhere in inconspicuous places, and even better - to use it to cut strips from it in those places where the whole tile does not become. When facing walls, you can use tiles of different colors, alternating them or building a pattern.

We cut the tiles

Since when tiling walls in a row, a whole number of tiles are often not stacked either in height or in width, the tiles have to be cut. This is done as follows. Having measured on the wall which part of the tile needs to be cut, the tilers measure on the tile, on its front side the required size and in this place they draw a cut line with a pencil along a ruler. Then, too, along a ruler with strong pressure, they scratch the glaze and part of the ceramic base of the tile under the glaze with a hard-alloy glass cutter or a victorious cutter. After that, the cut tile is taken by the edges with both hands and hit with the back side against the edge of a table or a thick board - the tile will split exactly along the drawn line. If there is a need to cut a narrow strip 20-30 mm wide, all marking and notching operations are repeated, and the strip itself is broken off with pliers. If you need a strip of even smaller width, first cut off the strip of the smallest possible width, and then gradually break it off with pliers to the desired size. Do differently with floor tiles. It is better to cut dense floor tiles with a tile cutter. At its core, it is a large roller glass cutter on a bed. It provides cutting and breaking of tiles at the same time.

If, when tiling with tiles, you need to bypass a pipe, do not try to break out a hole for this pipe in a whole tile with pliers, it will still crack, and the work will be wasted. It is much easier to immediately cut the tile in half, and then, using the same pliers, break out the profile of the half of the hole for the pipe. It will be much faster and more convenient. When it is necessary to make a hole in the tile, it is drilled. Large-diameter holes are made by drilling small holes along the inner contour or using a ballerina. The edges of the holes are smoothed with an abrasive bar. If a curly cut is needed at the edge of the tile, it is cut from it using a cutting machine with a disc on the stone.

Install corners

To give the room an elegant appearance, as well as to protect the corners when laying the tiles, decorative profiles are installed. Some of them have only decorative value and are mounted in the plane of the tile. Others also have a protective function - these are corner profiles (corners). They are placed at the outer corners. On such profiles there is a shelf that is laid under the tiles. When installing the corners, one of the sides of the corner is first lined flush with the second side of the corner. The end surfaces of the tile must be strictly aligned along the plane. Then a profile is applied to the other side and pressed with the tiles of the lower row. Both edges of the profile should be set flush with the planes of the tile or protrude slightly. There must be a thin layer of glue on the pressure tile in the area of contact with the profile shelf. Between the profile and the tile, you can leave a gap equal to the width of the seam, or you can not leave it, in which case the profile is attracted to the tile with masking tape until the glue hardens.

We make the ebb

When lining bathrooms, sometimes you have to deal with the situation that there is a large gap between the bathroom and the wall. In this case, you can make an ebb from the tile. It is installed on a cement-sand mortar. At the beginning, the tiles are cut. Consideration should be given to its future slope, the width of the seams and the position of the cut edge up. Then the gap between the bathtub and the wall is filled with something flush with the upper edge of the bathtub. This will keep the solution from spilling down. After that, the required amount of solution is mixed. The tile is wetted with cement milk or water. A solution is applied to its reverse side and put in place. Then it is gently tapped with a rubber mallet, while the upper edge is aligned with the plane of the wall and the required slope is achieved. Then, inserting crosses on all sides of the tile, make the necessary seams.

We rub the seams

After laying the tiles on the entire surface, grout the joints. For this, a rubber spatula and a foam sponge are used. Seams are very thoroughly cleaned from glue residues, dust and installed crosses. Then the grout is diluted. Fill the seams with a rubber spatula and leave to dry for 20 minutes. After that, the excess composition is washed off with a damp sponge and the seams are profiled. After the joints are completely dry, brush off the plaque from the tiles with a dry cloth. If desired, the surface of the tile is covered with special compounds that protect it from adverse influences and give it an additional gloss.

We repair tiles

If the tiles in the kitchen or bathroom are laid without taking into account all the recommendations that we talked about at the very beginning, sooner or later the tiles from the walls will crumble or fall out of the flooring. Usually this does not happen immediately, the tiles begin to fall one or two pieces. To put a wall with such defects in order, there is no need to completely clean it from the cladding and re-cover it. Therefore, the repair of the wall covering begins immediately after the first tile falls out of it. Most often, the tile falls off, and the solution on which it was held remains on the wall. Moreover, if you try to insert the dropped out tile into place, it will not go there. Therefore, the fallen out tile must first be grinded around the perimeter with an emery stone until it is free to fall into place. Later,having smeared the surface of the fallen out tile with PVA glue or epoxy glue, grease the frozen cement mortar holding the tile with the same glue, and apply the tile in place, slightly pressing it. Now it will stand as long as the cement mortar on which it was just glued will stick to the wall.

If the tile begins to fall off the wall along with the mortar, you need to carefully separate it along with the layer of mortar from the wall. If another 2-3 tiles "go" along with it, it's not scary, if only the rest stay in place. Most likely, the tile falls with the mortar due to the fact that the wall surface was not prepared correctly. The usual reason is the paint on the panels that has not been peeled off the wall. You will not be able to prepare the entire wall properly, but the area under the dropped tiles is a must. You need to be extremely careful, without hitting the wall, causing it to shake, scratch, scrape off the paint with a screwdriver or a knife and prime it with clean cement. After that, the fallen tiles will most likely have to be grinded around the perimeter with an emery stone (the last tile to be installed - exactly) and, diluting the cement mortar,install the dropped tiles in place so that their surface is in the same plane with the rest. If such a cosmetic repair is made in several places of the wall, where the tiles will fall out, the rest of the lined surface can stand for quite a long time.