Tiling

[John Rumm]

You can always abrade the surface and tile over them anyway.

[Samantha Booth]

Having looked at he site they do manual and electric ones. Which one do you have. I must say the manual one looks real easy to use but dont want to break more tiles than I lay.

[The Medway Handyman]

The manual ones - score & snap - are much faster than an electric tile saw, which abrades rather than cuts a tile. They will only do straight cuts & wont cope with thin strips off the edge of the tile - it will crack.

Electric ones will cut thin strips, cutouts even rough curves but are slow & make a mess.

Not sure about natural stone on a score & snap, don't think it would work.

If you are doing a fair amount of tiling, best to have both types. I'm sure there is more info on the FAQ or Wiki thingy.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I only found score and snap worked on fairly thin tiles: and even then not that well. Useless on thibck tiles, tiles with relief surfaces, and natural stome prodes.

Since getting the electric, I simply don't use score and snap.

If you are a pro, and do a lot of plain white bathrooms, its probably a fast way to do it. For anyone else, use the electric.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Are you saying there are some you could use for a heavy tile which won't then slip down the wall if not supported below? Sounds like magic to me. ;-)

[stuart noble]

Suction rather than magic. IME the slip only lasts for about 5 minutes, so you can either give them an upward shove or pop a couple of nails in if you're likely to forget

[stuart noble]

Snappers work perfectly well on ceramic floor tiles, with or without a relief pattern. Okay, taking 5mm off ish't possible but 20mm and above is fine. Of course, the decent ones cost more than the cheap saws but they are just so much faster. The saw only comes out for fiddly cuts.

[dennis]

Tungsten wheeled glass cutter and a matchstick should be fine.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Right. In which case the Homebase stuff passes that test. I dunno where you get all those fancy adhesives round here so a shed suits me better - especially on a Sunday or evening.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

You need to try that with some decent tiles. You'll fail.

[stuart noble]

Ready mixed stuff in tubs is always expensive compared to the powdered forms, partly because the lightweight fillers they use are better mixed by machine

[dennis]

More like some cr@p tiles and it will fail. But you probably don't think ease of fitting counts.

[John Rumm]

With some of the better adhesives the lighter weight tiles will simply stick and stay put. Heavy ones will always need extra help.

[John Rumm]

Yes good point - plasplugs make both.

for one of the bigger more serious looking score and snap ones that let you get plenty of leverage on the wheel and auto snaps the tiles.

I have the "COMPACT CONTRACTOR (CTC330)"

For the electric I just have the small one - I bought it for a particular job for which that size was adequate. If I were choosing a general purpose machine I would probably go for a larger one.

[John Rumm]

OK for a one off if you have nothing better.

Not the way to do a full room. Having the built in sliding fence and cutting guides on a decent cutter makes for much better repeat accuracy, its also far quicker and easier, and you can make cuts you will not manage with any degree of repeatability using match sticks.

[Andy Hall]

Not suitable for stone either - especially the softer ones. The edges will crumble. An electric saw is pretty much essential with stone. Water and moving slowly an steadily is the route to success.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

I wonder how good those ones are where the saw slides on runners rather than you moving the tile? They're a lot bigger - but would make cutting large tiles at an angle easy.

[Andy Hall]

I've seen them used by professionals. Rubi seems to be the popular brand, and they wil cut large stone tiles at an angle.

You can do this on the smaller ones but it's more difficult. The main thing is to go slowly but steadily and plenty of water.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

The only way with large tiles is to cut freehand. My Plasplugs has a guide for angled cutting but only works with small tiles and isn't very accurate. Of course that might be more the operator. ;-)

[F]

I got a £30 Focus DIY own brand last year and it's worked fine. Great for cutting L shapes. I fitted a new blade after ~50 boxes of tiles!

Just try to avoid using it in the garage with the door open in February!