travertine wet room problems

[bigbrother3269]

In may 2009 i did a bthroom conversion for a very good customer using travertine honed and filled tiles(customer choice),bal natural stone adhesive and bal superflex grout-all supplied by topps tiles.The basic plan was rip out old suite and shower and walls,make good and check floor(concrete),install floor drain and tank.re tiling commenced with a electric heating mat over 6mm insulated sheet and primer/pva on the subfloor,the wet area being in one corner of the room.on compleation all looked fine but i did report cutting problems to customer and topps at the time-tiles crumbled or cut rough.i allowed 6 weeks before turning on the heating system and all was ok-after about a month i had several tiles lift in one area-followed by 5 other areas over the last 14 months.lift the tiles and find the adhesive gone to powder behind,relay using new adhesive problem solved....latest batch off tiles lifted 2 month ago-heating system switched off since april this year-same probs with the adhesive,Bal rep inspects and report says no problem with adhesive.Also a fair few tiles are chipping at the edges and breaking away-2 coats of sealent was applied on compleation-also no probs with tiles in wet area lifting but 3 have large chips on edges-its sending me up the wall and customer is rightly getting fed up!.anyone had similar probs or got any ideas?-i still think adhesive was faulty and reacted to heat and perhaps bad batch of tiles-either way at the moment it blame the tradesman time...

 

[bookahandyman]

tavertine are evry porous , did you seal the under side before laying at all? it does sound a bit more like adhesive issues to me. as for the chipping, maybe a cheap tile disguised as an expensive one. some dodgy tile companies out there pretending to be top notch and are in fact the 'land of leather' for tiles.

 

[tictic]

did you follow mfr instructions re:turning on the ufh..
did you clean subfloor then prime with a sbr or acrylic primer.
did you wipe/clean the arse of the tiles(dust/dirt etc) of them.
did you back butter tiles to ensure full coverage.
cos you have got a debonding problem here..this is sometimes down to not cleaning tiles
or you have movement in the subfloor..water ingress thro the grout and the tiles..

but the "tiles" do sound like a cheap import from china..did the tiles come from topps?..if so thats were my money would be...

 

[bigbrother3269]

hi tictic,yes i gave the ufh a little longer as i always do-i've seen the results off turning on too soon,and yes it was topps that supplied the tiles-have you heard of anyone else having trouble then?,one of the interesting points in the report from BAL was the presence of Etringite in the adhesive samples-a form of salt crystal apparantly....but not sure where and how it gets there!-it can break down the adhesive so they tell me,if its good enough to penatrate the primer,insulated mat and adhesive holding them down then into the tile adhesive itself in almost the same sequence i laid the tiles with the first 2 bags of adhesive it may be a coincidance-or not me thinks.i still think i had a dodgy batch of adhesive as once replaced no more problems in that area-full stop!,so if its a subfloor issue how come it dont re-occur i asked?,Bal stumped and gone very quiet now,i've suspected the other prob with the tiles was always due to quality,again topps very quiet as well,perhaps its one of those blame the tradesman times?,either way i'd welcome anyones opinion at this stage-i'm stumped and going in circles,time to put the heating back on soon-what fun that may bring???.

 

[tictic]

ettringate(calcuim sulfate).....

sounds like the conctrete screed was a GYPSUM one...is it about 40-45mm thick..
and this has reactied to the cement based adhesive,some primer dont take to well to this type of screed...some mfr prefer you to use an epoxy primer instead mate...

i have seen this in only one job were the whole floor "blow" it was a new biuld house, ground floor kitchen/dinner the fixer didnt sand the laitance from the floor or prime it either..

re:tiles
travertine/limestone...imo is a very weak tile even the "good" ones mate..
the make up off these tiles is...the face of them is infilled with a resin to fill the viods in the tiles and the arse of them to,but still a weak tile(but they are nice to look at)..with water and foot traffic going over them they will weaken over time,even putting a sealer on to them(at least once a year for maintance)..they will start breaking in the corners as you have had mate...and "if" they are a cheap import from the far east..well you me and any fixer are in the soapy bubble bud....

re:screed.
did bal not do a check on the screed i.e.take a sample off it?

cant think of anything else bigbrother3269.

need to lie in a dark room now mate after wtriting all this...

best of mate.

 

[tictic]

ment to ask what type of shower was fixed...

was it a power shower???..

 

[bigbrother3269]

Hello again Tictic-you seem to be singing from the same sheet as i am now-the shower was initially pumped gravity-then we installed combi for customer so now direct through that,point to note is that apart from 1 tile chipping in the wet area no other probs there-all other probs have been in the dry zones.yes what you put on this ettringite is what Bal reckon,only you put a bit more info!,too be honest i kinda feel all support backing away at the moment,i've been in touch with the Stone Federation and a company called Ceram Reserch-both back up with what you say about travertine and quality-i wonder where Topps got this from then?,as my customer has said today-does this mean its going to carry on then,she's well peed off and i feel so sorry for her,what was meant to be a pleasurable room has turned into a part nightmare-good job the other 2 bathrooms not suffering this problem.you want a dark room-i'm in a cave in the hills hiding!!
thanks for your help
stu