Don't rush in
Brett's first word of advice to our trainee tilers is to make sure they have all the materials they need, and read the plans carefully. The tiles in the Bricking It flat are made of high quality natural stone, so any mistakes will hit the completion bonus hard.
Ask the right questions
The trainees discussed the timings with Dr Phil and the trades people. They also talked through anything they weren't sure about with Tara, the designer, such as which way the grain of the stone should run. Without this attention to detail costly mistakes are easily made.
Limestone and marble
The tiles in the Bricking It bathroom are made of natural limestone and marble. These are expensive, as well as heavy and difficult to work with, even for an experienced tiler. They stain easily, so the tiles need to be coated with a special sealer several times. The stone is also liable to crack, so great care needed to be taken by our trainee tilers when handling the tiles.
Cutting the tiles
The tiles were cut using a wet saw. This pumps water continually onto the cutting blade, keeping the stone cool and cutting down the risk of chipping. The heavy stone tiles are 400mm square. This made it difficult for our trainees to position them for cutting.
Preparing the walls
It's essential that the wall surface (or substrate as it's sometimes called) is properly prepared, especially when the tiles are heavy. It has to be free of all dust or oil so the tile cement cement can work effectively. The substrate also has to be strong enough to take the weight.
More wall preparation
The plasterboard walls were primed using an acrylic bonding agent. With the high quality of modern glues you probably don't strictly need the bonding agent, but Brett's advice to our trainees is that it's better to be safe than sorry. There's always a small chance that the tiles could come loose at some point.
After the priming, a waterproof fibre matting was fitted. This creates a slightly flexible layer for the tiles to sit on so they don't crack if there is any movement in the structure of the walls. A waterproof membrane is painted over the matting before the tiles themselves are fixed.
Fixing the tiles
The golden rule for laying tiles is always use a spirit level to make sure they are perfectly flat. Because the joint area is only 1.5mm wide there is little room for error.
Grouting
When the tiles are fixed to the wall, the gaps between them need to be filled in with grout. The trick is not to leave too much grout residue on the surface of the tiles. This will have to be removed later and takes a lot of elbow grease.
And finally…
After the grouting all that remains is for the tiles to be cleaned and polished and for the third and final coat of sealer to be applied.
