Cement Or 'Proper' Tile Adhesive For Vertical Tiles?Pictures

[Tozzy]

Hi!

I'm still tiling the steps and I have run out of powdered tile adhesive for the tiles that stick on upright. Will cement and sand work or should I really use the proper stuff? I really don't want to pay another £6.99 for another bag just for the sake of 3 tiles .

Remember that these are vertical tiles I'm sticking to the concrete steps.

Any opinions very welcome.

Thanks!

 

[Softus]

Will cement and sand work or should I really use the proper stuff?

Proper stuff.

I really don't want to pay another £6.99 for another bag just for the sake of 3 tiles

Eeh, wha'd'ya gonna do?

 

[Tozzy]

ah well, looks like it's going to have to be cement and sand then .

 

[Softus]

So why did you ask the question?

 

[Tozzy]

So why did you ask the question?

I knew you were going to ask me that question .

I was thinking earlier on about going against your idea because I am on a strict budget now for buying 'proper' materials, but it's the final job that counts so I'm not going to skimp on this one . I will definitely use the proper tile adhesive, despite the depth being about 2 inches in parts . It's strange how they say on the bag that you can only level something up to a maximum of 12CM. I don't think it will make much difference how much I use to level up.

I think I picked the hardest room to tile .

Anyway, thanks for your reply!

 

[Softus]

I will definitely use the proper tile adhesive, despite the depth being about 2 inches in parts . It's strange how they say on the bag that you can only level something up to a maximum of 12CM.

Er, but 2" is only 5cm.

 

[Tozzy]

LOL 12CM!! Sorry. Don't know what the hell I was thinking there . 12mm. Sorry about that lol.

 

[Softus]

If the adhesive manufacturer says the maximum depth is 12mm, then the maximum depth is 12mm, and making it 50mm would be unwise.

 

[Tozzy]

making it 50mm would be unwise

Unfortunately, I had to discover this today . It was a bloody disaster and a waste of time. I thought I'd get away with using the adhesive to fill a gap of about 2 inches (stupid of me I know lol) and ok, I put the tile on, levelled it all up, thought everything was great. Made myself a cup of tea, returned and the tile had sunk! I was really annoyed as I wasted a LOT of adhesive and had the job of clearing up all the mess to start again with cement and sand.

Just some advice to first timers, always abide by the guidelines. Never think it will be ok because it isn't, well for me it wasn't lol. Sand and cement is brilliant because you can level it up a lot easier by 'stuffing the turkey' not with stuffing, but in this case, with sand and cement .

Always have the tile lower so that you need to raise it up to the correct level because it's not easy hammering the tile down as the cement is not as runny.

Infact, I think I'll post up some pictures of my handy work in the next few hours .

 

[Softus]

Are you saying that you've used sand & cement INSTEAD of tile adhesive?

I say again:

In fact,

 

[Tozzy]

I saw this thread a while back:

//www.diynot.com/forums/viewtopic.php?p=533393

noseall knows all .

Oh and by the way, I mixed a bit of PVA (3:1 water) with it. So Softus you must be wrong , or is noseall wrong?

 

[noseall]

neither of us is wrong.

how could we be.

sand and cement was used for donkeys years to fix tiles and to great success, particularly in milking parlours where large beast would be impacting against the tiles.

i have to say though the rapid set adhesives are far more convenient.

 

[Softus]

Oh and by the way, I mixed a bit of PVA (3:1 water) with it. So Softus you must be wrong , or is noseall wrong?

No - I'm wrong, after a fashion.

I confused this topic with another one I was reading, and forgot that you were tiling onto a solid substrate instead of, say, a wooden floor, the point being that a solid one doesn't need any flexibility in the adhesive.

 

[Tozzy]

I was thinking earlier:

Sand and cement is used to bind bricks together so why not tiles? Ok, tiles are subjected to weight, well so are bricks. Adhesive contains cement, so does the sand I use when mixed to make mortar.

Ah I think it'll be fine . The trick is to spray a few drops of water onto the reverse of the tiles and trowel the mortar onto a bed of PVA (3:1 water).

 

[Tozzy]

Ok, I know you're all DIYING (geddit?) to see my handy work :

The outside room slopes down to the right so I had no choice there, but to 'go with the flow'. Top left tile you can how out my cut was, but that's because I couldn't 'score and snap' due to the tile being too small. I didn't have a proper tile machine at the time either, but it wasn't my fault that the door moulding was put on like that . Also, the two steps aren't the same length from front to back because the vertical tiles for the top step would have had a gap of about 60mm-100mm lol so I couldn't extend the top horizontal tile any more.

As you can see I'm one happy child!

So what do you reckon, is it ok for a first timer?