Cracked Kitchen Floor Tiles

We noticed after arriving back from a weekend away that the ceramic floor tiles in the kitchen are making a crunching/cracking sound when we walk on them. They were fine before we went away.

Also, the grout in between some of the tiles has cracked and a couple of the tiles have hairline cracks in them.

We happen to have a rubber ball which if we bounce on some of the tiles it makes a sort of hollow sounding noise, whereas if we bounce the ball on other tiles it makes a much more solid noise. We know for a fact that before now if we bounced the ball on any of the tiles it always made the solid noise.

Nothing has changed structurally - when we were away for the weekend we turned the central heating thermostat down a bit.

The house is 7 and a half years old - the tiles have been down since new. As far as I'm aware the floor underneath is concrete.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas what might have caused this?

badboyhouse, good evening.

Sounds like you have a leak of water from the appliance nearest to the defective tiles?

Suggest you check out as above? it will possibly mean that you will have to drag out the nearest appliance??

What happens in general is that the floor tiles stop just under / behind the base kick plates of the base units, in the event of a leak the water floods out on to the [Concrete?] floor ans percolates between the Concrete and the tiles, then the crunching starts

I have seen dozen of such cases as Insurance Claims.

Ken.

Good evening Ken

It doesn’t look like there’s a leak - we turned the mains water off today for several hours and the meter reading didn’t change. Additionally we left the mains on afterwards but didn’t use anything that draws water and again the meter readings didn’t change.

The tiles that are making the hollow noise are on one side of the kitchen.

Another tile today popped and now has a crack in it.

Is it possible that the tiles may have been laid incorrectly and it’s taken seven and a half years in order for them to fail or would the problem have been from the start if this was the case?

badboyhouse, good evening again.

Sorry but not entirely clear? are there any appliances close to the cracking tiles? or are the cracking tiles some distance from an appliance?

Your water meter test seems fairly conclusive, in that there is no water mains feed leak.

OK what about a leak on the waste water side of the appliances? meaning a leak between the appliance and the waste pipe to which the appliance is connected?

Or? are the tiles cracking at or near a Radiator??

Ken.

Hi Ken.

The cracking tiles are some distance from the appliance and aren’t near a radiator.

The nearest appliance is a couple of meters away and is the dishwasher but we’ve had the kick board down and looked underneath the dishwasher and it’s completely dry. The same goes for under the sink which is next to the dishwasher.

The waste water pipe from the dishwasher goes in the cupboard under the sink and is completely dry.

The washing machine is over the other side of the kitchen in a separate utility cupboard which is completely dry underneath.

Have you lifted any of the tiles to see what's happening underneath.

Doggit said:

Have you lifted any of the tiles to see what's happening underneath.

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No haven’t lifted any up as there isn’t any physical movement and they’re grouted in. The cracks are hairline so nothing is loose.

We’ve got a tiler/plumber coming to have a look at the weekend see if he can shed any light on it.