Control joint installed through a tile installationThat title right there is absolutely ripe for me to go off on a sophomoric, mildly humorous rant about the viability of inferior illegal plant use. But I’m not gonna do that. (Okay, maybe later…)

A soft joint, or control joint,  is simply one grout line, all the way down the length of your installation, that is filled with colored silicone or caulk rather than grout. The purpose of a soft joint is to allow movement in your installation without cracking tiles or grout. When placed properly it will absorb any ‘normal’ seasonal and structural movements inherent in structures.

There are guidelines that need to be followed for a soft joint to be effective. The TCNA guidelines call for a control joint every 20′ – 25′ in each direction for interior installations and every 8′ – 12′ in each direction for exterior installations. Interior installations which are exposed to direct sunlight also need control joints every 8′ – 12′.

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How to Drill a Hole in TileMake a hole!!! Ummm, sorry, had a little flashback there for a second. Where was I? Oh yeah, drilling a hole in a tile. When you tile your shower wall you will usually have at least one or two holes that need to be taken out of your tile. This is often a huge pain in the ass and sometimes difficult to do without cracking the tile. So I’m gonna show you how I do it. This will not guarantee that your tile will not crack! It does, however, greatly diminish the possibility. This method works with all ceramics and porcelains as well as natural stones such as granite, marble and travertine.

If at all possible try to lay out your tile so that any pipes or fixtures fall on a grout line. If you can do this you can simply cut a small square out of the edge of it with the wet saw and forgo the whole drillin’ a hole thing. I know, it’s not always possible. In fact it rarely happens in a normal tub surround. So lets drill a hole in that sucker!

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Cracked floor tile due to improper substrate preparationI know there are some people out there (not my regular readers like you!) that read what I write and think to themselves ‘okay, but I’m sure that won’t happen with my installation’. So periodically I’m gonna post things like this that show exactly what happens when things aren’t built correctly. And yes, it will happen to yours, too, if the proper steps aren’t taken. If you care to see more train wrecks you can check out my ‘flawed‘ page wherein I post photos of absolutely horrible tile installations which I’ve torn out and replaced.

See that crack in the tile right there? (The line down the center is not a grout line – it’s a crack. You can click on it for a larger version) That bathroom floor is less than eight months old. It was installed with hardibacker over the subfloor and thinset. At least that part is correct, but that was about it. There was no thinset beneath the hardi and the seams between the sheets were not taped and thinsetted. To a lesser extent the correct screws were not used in the hardi – they committed the cardinal sin of using drywall screws in the backerboard. Yeah. Wrong.

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Finished tiled shower ceilingMichael has recently pointed out (a bit more eloquently than I would have) that I have indeed been a lazy bastard and have not yet written this post. Apparently people actually want to know how to do stuff I do – weird, right? So here you go – making your ceiling shiny.

The main problem people have with tiling a ceiling is getting the tile to stay where they put it. Believe me, I’ve had more than one tile fall on my noggin before I figured out what works. Since I’m relatively certain you aren’t very interested in what doesn’t work I’ll tell you what does, it saves headaches – literally.

You do not need a $75 bag of non-sag thinset to tile a ceiling. Non-sag thinset is basically just thinset that is sticky – it’s great stuff! It’s also expensive stuff. You can accomplish the same with the $15 bag of regular modified thinset.

Before you start hanging head-bashers (ceiling tile) you should, as always, have the substrate properly prepared. They do not always need to be waterproof. It’s a good idea and never hurts, but it isn’t always necessary. The photos of the shower I have here was in a small bathroom with limited ventilation so I waterproofed the ceiling as well.

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Close-up of lugs on lugged tiles

Close up of the lugs on lugged tiles

I actually get a load of traffic to my blog with this very question (welcome to my blog which you found by typing that very question). A lugged tile is simply a tile that is self-spacing.

Lugged tiles are most commonly found in the form of 4 x 4 inch or 6 x 6 inch wall tiles commonly used in bathtub surrounds, small showers, and kitchen backsplashes (normally by builders). Standard tiled bathtubs normally use lugged tiles.

Each tile has two or three little ‘nubs’ on each side of the tile which, when stacked upon one another, keep the tiles a consistent distance apart. You can see the lugs in the photo above (click on it for a full-size version). The nubs of the tile actually stack on top of each other to create a nice, even grout line. With the standard lugged tile this grout line is just a bit under 1/16″.

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Absolutely flat travertine tile bathroom floorI constantly reiterate the need for a tile installation to be flat. Not necessarily level, but always flat. This is the mark of a true professional and the thing that turns an ‘okay’ installation into a spectacular installation. (Did I just type ‘spectacular? Jesus…) Anyway, the method I use on floor tile to get it flat is fairly simple and ensures that each tile is the exact same height as the tiles surrounding it.

Before I show you that you need to understand, as always, that the substrate preparation is the most important aspect of this. If your tile substrate looks like a skate park you’re never going to get a flat tile installation over the top of it. Your substrate needs to be as flat as you can possibly get it. Take time with your preparation – it makes the rest of the installation run smoothly and gives you a solid foundation.

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Free TileTips Newsletter from the FloorElf

You can now purchase Tile Tips all at once rather than waiting over six months for them! Just scroll down below the form and get it all now!

Over the past seventeen (almost eighteen it’s over twenty now! – damn I’m gettin’ old) years in the tile trade I have learned a couple of things:

1) People sometimes do not appreciate my sense of humor

2) I oftentimes think I’m funnier than I actually am

3) I sometimes end sentences with inappropriate auxiliary verbs (see above) or start them with a conjunction (see below)

4) And I’ve learned a thing or two about tile

Since the first three on the list are highly unlikely to change or help you I’d like to concentrate on the last – Tile Tips. Since you’re reading this I’m assuming one of two things: either you are interested in learning about tile or you enjoy really bad humor.

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We, meaning us evil, scheming people in the tile industry, have a bad habit of using words that are not easily understood or recognized by the general public – and that’s a bad thing. Well, I think it’s a bad thing anyway, since the general public are the ones buying the tile – Hello, McFly??? Take for instance those three ridiculously nondescript words up there: Honed, rectified, and gauged – as well as the word ‘nondescript’. Okay, we’ll leave the last one out of this discussion.

Taken alone they each have very distinct meanings – easy enough. However, when used next to the word tile or stone, they tend to confuse. So I’m gonna try to clear it up a little bit for you so you know what a gauged slate is when you see it, as well as help you find the word you need when you know what you’re looking for but don’t know what word you need. (Is anyone else dizzy right now? No? Just me? okay…)

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As some of you may know (or simply don’t care about – but know anyway) I actually do reply to every question I’m asked on this site. It may take a while for me to sober up enough get enough time away from work to answer it – but I do. As such I am frequently asked the same or similar questions a lot. I’m going to start turning these questions and answers into blog posts to leave myself more beer drinking time to help people with the same problems. So here’s my first one. If you have a suggestion for future posts like these just let me know and I’ll be more than happy to cobble together some similarly ridiculous advice for your problem. I will not share any names or other information with anyone else because – well, it’s none of their damn business – so no homeowners were harmed during the writing of this post.

Here’s the question:

My husband and I have recently tiled our kitchen and laundry room. It is a 35 year old house that had kitchen carpet in both areas. We removed the carpet and old linoleum was underneath. We installed backerboard thinset extra like you suggested on this site, which i read just now to make sure. Now we have something like a fault line running through our grout. We did remove the grout down to the thinset and cleaned out as much as we could then regrouted. Of course it cracked again within 2 weeks of the repair. I do suspect a tile is moving but is there any sure way to know if it is just that tile or more and if so what is the best way to fix it. Also I am not sure why it would move with backerboard under it could it be the floor itself?

My response to this all-too-common question is a bit complicated since it is rarely one specific reason and could be a number of things.

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SpectraLOCK logo

If you have read anything on either of my websites you should know that I tell everyone on the face of the planet who will listen (all three of them) that Laticrete’s SpectraLOCK is the only epoxy grout I will use – period. So rather than just talk smack I’m gonna show you why.

You see the bottom of that logo up there? The part that says ‘Grout that Locks in Color and Blocks Out Stains’? I’m going to put that to the test. And being the kind of warped individual I am – I’m gonna do it in the most ridiculous, convincing way I know how.

Since I have kids I happen to know what the most vile, dangerous, and toxic staining substance on the face of the planet actually is. It is not red wine, a sharpie, or grape juice. Not even close.

It’s cherry kool-aid.

If you have kids you know exactly what I’m talking typing about. If I even set my beer Pepsi near a cup of cherry kool-aid it turns pink through either osmosis or sheer fright, I’m not sure which. This stuff is brutal. I’m fairly certain kool-aid consists of toxic radiation and sugar. The toxic radiation is purchased in powdered form and my kids add about 3 lbs. of sugar per quart.

They like their radiation sweet.

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Ditra vs ProvaFlex

Ditra vs ProvaFlex

That’s right, I said typed it! Bring it on :guedo:

In the last month or so there has been a lot of hype about Loxscreen’s new polypropylene tile underlayment membrane. That’s just a big phrase for plastic tile underlayment. It is being marketed as a replacement product for Schluter Ditra.

Since I use Schluter Ditra almost exclusively as my preferred underlayment for floor tile I felt it would be a good idea to give this stuff a try. I did not do this in order to find a replacement for Ditra, I’m extremely happy with Ditra. I do feel, however, that due to the way this product is being ‘marketed’ to consumers and since it claims to be a replacement for a product I regularly use, people may want a professional opinion about the way it performs. AND! if there is something better out there – I want it.

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Since I’m just a tile guy I”m not usually up on all the new technological crap that has nothing to do with tile, like online video or the ‘SlapChop’.  I’ve decided that since I spend most of my days in other people’s showers that I should get out more and learn something else.

So naturally, since I own kitchen knives, I decided to make a video about a tile subject. So here is my first video, sans sound because in audio I sound like a drunk leprechaun, for my readers. Umm – that’s you.

And since I actually have a day job and bills to pay all you get is a time-lapse photography of the creation of a mud deck for a tiled shower floor. But I’m gonna call it a tile video ’cause Google loves that shit. :whistle:

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