I'm about to tile a kitchen floor (green chipboard) with ceramic tiles. The floor was previously covered with vinyl that was very well stuck-down with something like evo-stik. Will the regular flexible adhesives for floor tiles adhere to old evo-stik or do I need something special?
Hope you're also re-enforcing the floor as I don't reckon ordinary chipboard is rigid enough for ceramic tiles.
Throw it out with the chipboard & replace with very well braced plywood.
Jim K
I did the bathroom and shower room quite a few years go and they've been fine, but I guess the kitchen sees much more use. It seems that 6mm Hardie Backer or no-more-ply boards would solve both problems so I'll do some more investigating.
It is IF its braced on siund joists
nothing wrong with the chip but the glue is an issue
I found tiling costs with decent tiles and cement in the £20-£30 a sq meter range.
At that sort of price I would STRONGLY recommend you rip up the chip and lay fresh.
That also gives you the option of adding more support for the floor - any flexing will make for loss and or cracked tiles.
Herring bone struts help a lot.
Or, if you have the depth, add another layer of chip or something else on top.
My point will be spending a LOT on a quality finish and that even with flexible tile adhesive you will get cracking unless the floor is pretty rigid.
So don't try and save a few hundred quid using old chip covered in glue. You probably could rough it up but why take the risk?
Lift that chip and lay side by side beams and herringbone strut the thing, and then put down new chip and use quality flexible adhesive or a good fast setter - I've used ardurit - and then do a pukka job on the expensive tiles.
Flexible adhesive is a bodge to get round a crap floor. Make a good floor and you wont need it.
Nothing wrong with chip - just as stiff as ply - but well braced is the key.
Personally I'd overboard or replace the chip with 18mm WBP ply.
Then the correct adhesive is a cementious tile adhesive with Class S2 flexibility plus a flexible grout.
Look at BAL and Mapei adhesives - some are Class S2 as as, some have an additive liquid that can be added to vanilla powered adhesive to get the flexibility required.
Please understand that "flexible" != rubber. It adds just enough "give" to allow the very slight flexing of 18mm ply to not cause problems. You still need a basically solid and unmoving substrate - chip would be too chancy for my liking.
Chip + damp from wherever = weetabix
Jim K
Pal has a chipboard floor laid on polystyrene over concrete. Had it tiled using the correct adhesive. Several broke.
When I did my kitchen floor a good few years ago, I ripped up the 12mm chipboard to reveal the joists were unevenly spaced and 3 were rotten in some place. The original floor joist were something 4 x 2, so I then replaced every floor joist with 5 x 2.1/2 I think. They were bigger anyway. I then put several noggins in between the new joists to make the whole lot solid and secure. I used 20mm marine ply on top of the joist and then 6mm wpb on top of that which was nailed every 18/20 inches down on to the 20mm ply. Ceramic tile on top of that and the floor has been sound and solid ever since.
Which goes to show that its preparation which counts.
in ten years wet tiles no penetration.
+1
Al these people wittering on about flex adhesive and water getting to their chip means they are expecting to do a bodged job.
Don't bodge the job and it will be fine forever
And that means a no flex floor and lots of bracing.
There is nothing "bodgy" about flexible adhesive - it is the correct material for this application.
Unless the floor is solid screed it needs flexible adhesive.
So a sample of one ?!?
YMMV
Jim K
FSV of finger crossing...
Jim K
Do you know what is under the chipboard?
if it's a house built in the last 15 to 20 years, the ground floors are likely laid directly on polystyrene slabs, which are laid on a vapour barrier and the earth.
Over time the polystyrene compresses in the most walked paths, you may notice a little creaking or movement, but it's not often that much of a problem...... until someone decides to lay a rigid flooring,
My parents did just this, and had 3 years of hell trying to stop the tiles cracking, or the joints turning to powder, and the tiles coming unstuck,
As they had no intention of replacing the kitchen, they were not going to rip the floor up and put down beams, they tried injecting expanding foam through the chipboard in the most compressed areas (after ripping up the tiles to do it again), this seem'd to help in those areas, but other areas soon sunk and allowed the new tiles to crack,
They eventually gave up and had some cushion flooring put down, looks so much better, no chance of it cracking, and much warmer to walk on in bare feet.
Unless you like a gamble...
Jim K
Directly on earth? Sounds poor.
But I can testify that chip over polystyrene over beam+block compressed badly in the doorways due to concentrated traffic. I found this when laying laminate in a flat.
against building regs too
should be screed over beam/block.
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