I would like to lay pre-sealed Saltillo tiles down in my laundry room.
Floor is concrete and uneven.
Uneven means the slab was poured up to a pre-existing concrete slab which is a tiny bit lower than the newer slab which was feathered down to the meet pre-existing slab.
Tiles will cover both slabs.
What are the correct steps to do this project?
Do I first use a floor leveler compound?
What do I use for waterproofing?
Thinset, etc., etc.
TIA
Saltillo tiles (unless you get the sissy machine made ones) are inherently uneven on the backs - all sorts of bumps and dips - so a smidge of unevenness in the concrete matters not one whit. ______________
No need ________________
Water proofing what? The tiles? You said they were pre-sealed. _________________
Yes, plain old thinset. I use the cheapest I can find, under $5.00 for a 60# bag at HD. Just use plenty of it, comb out with a 1/2" notch trowel. Even that may not be enough, the tiles themselves will often vary 1/4". Main thing is that you want the tile well supported...if you use too much the worst that will happen is that some will squeeze out into the grout joints. No big deal, you are going to fill them up anyway with mortar anyway.
BTW, non-machine made Saltillo varies in length/width as well as thickness from tile to tile. Moreover, thay aren't square so don't try to lay them with narrow grout lines.
-- dadiOH ____________________________
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Thanks for the reply and info. Very much appreciated. Regarding waterproofing, I am under the impression that miosture could come up thru the concrete slab and cause problems with the thinset and/or tiles.
Nope. Even if you flattened up the floor, the saltillo won't be flat. It never is (I'm assuming you're buying true saltillo and not the machine made crap).
Are you talking about sealing the Pre-sealed tiles? I invetigated saltillo for a while and decided against using the presealed stuff. I decided I wanted to do the sealing myself so I could re-do it easily enough down the road. With the pre-sealed, there was really no way to know what products down the road would be compatible or not. As well, I found the unsealed tiles to have much better color variations etc.... Got the stuff at HD for like 94 cents a tile. Worked great. Perhaps you are referring to keeping moisture from entering from the concrete?
How long has your slab cured? Any cracks? If it hasn't been curing for a few years or there are cracks, I would recommend putting down some Anti-fracture compound before the thinset. One brand name is Redguard by Custom Building products. If I were to do my saltillo over, I think I would just go ahead and put either this stuff or a membrane down....cheap (well not really) insurance against cracks down the road. As for thinset, I used a medium priced stuff that had more flex to it, just in case my slab does decide to crack. You want to use a 1/2"x1/2" trowel to put it down. Wash the backs of the tiles off with a sponge, back butter them, and put in place. Typically grout joints are 1/2" to 3/4". Regular grout won't handle that. I found a product called Pavermix that is meant for just this joint size and it worked well. The other option is to just mix Portland cement and sand to create your own grout. Cheers, cc
that will cause white discolorations on the top of the tile, unless the backs are also sealed. if this is a problem, then you might want to put down a full coat of antifracture membrane first.
tape a 3' square piece of clear plastic down for a few days. if you get condensation under the plastic, then you should do something about this.
Thanks again for the helpful info.
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