My kitchen carpet is knackered, and pricing it up, it wouldnt be a great deal more expensive to lay a tiled floor compared to getting a new carpet.
Topps Tiles have some slate tiles in at the mo for £1.29 each, so less than £100 to do the lot.(obviously plus cement and grout etc)
I bought a sample, just to see what it would look like, and found the top surface is nice and smooth, but the rear is certainly not flat, 2 levels on it, with a 3 or 4 mm difference in height on that side.
They have more expensive tiles in stock - 50p each more, are these likely to be a more level surface on the rear, or do all slate tiles have undulating surfaces?
Most slate tiles are supplied as riven on one side (meaning as naturally cleaved) and calibrated (meaning rough machined) on the other.
Those are intended to be laid with the riven face upwards - i.e. the natural rough side; so in essence you are looking at them upside down from how they are intended to be used. The reason for the flat underside is to make it easier to bed the tiles on the adhesive. There is enough fun as it is with the variation in thickness of the tiles.
Generally the problem with a calibrated surface is that it is rough machining and you can see the machining marks which looks most unnatural - especially as there will be a variation in machining pattern.
Some stone is sold in honed form, meaning that it is further machined to a smooth surface such that machining disappears. Usually this costs quite a bit more than calibrated because of the extra work. Thickness is usually consistent as well. Finally you can have polished stone where there is a final polish of the honed surface. This is not a lot more than honed.
Polished and honed are generally the finishes given to limestone or marble for wall or floor tiles. It is not so common for slate. You might be able to find it but it would cost a lot more I suspect.
Generally the least expensive tiles are calibrated on one side and riven on the other and sold in small format - meaning 300mm square. You pay more per area for the larger tiles (more wastage in production) and for unusual patterns and fossils.
The intent in a riven surface is to have no more than about 2-3mm of steps. If it's getting up to 4 or more then it can start looking too rough, although that's a personal choice.
Other points:
- Tthe material you end up getting may vary in appearance quite a bit from samples. Slate is always all over the place if you are looking at the types with iron deposits etc. - e.g. Chinese and Indian origin. Welsh and some Brazilian slate is more consistent in colour. If it's a stock item then I'd look at the actual products. Special order is generally that you get what you get.
- It's worth looking at specialist stone places. Sometimes they are more expensive than tile places, sometimes not. Either way, there is a lot of choice. I found Stonell to be a good supplier.
- Grout. Choose colour carefully. Grey tends to be the most popular colour but there are lots of shades of grey. The tiler that I used always uses Ardex products and I used them myself on a recent wall tiling project. Very good quality and equally good technical department. There are numerous types od adhesive as well depending on working time wanted and other factors.
- Sealer and finish. I think that Lithofin products are probably the best on the market - they seem to be used by the professionals and are readily available. The regime is to use a sealer before grouting and again afterwards. For slate floors, the product of choice is MN Stainstop. It appears to be relatively expensive, but a little goes a long way. Probably for the size you mention 500ml can would do it. I also used their Colour Enhancer product. The idea of this is to raise the colours with imparting a gloss finish. A glossy looking riven floor doesn't look right at all.
Slate is slate and tiles are tiles. A good quality riven slate is accurate to aboput +1 1mm or so. Laying em is a bit of an art due to what you have already noticed..you have to adjust each tile to fit its neighbour as best you can
Thanks very much for that info - I would have been laying them upside down. I've checked again for any tool marks on the flat surface, but they are 'as natural', so the one I've got could be laid flat side up - if they were all like that there wouldnt be a problem, apart from getting them all level.
I'd presumed there were different grades, with the cheapest being the roughest, and of course, I presumed the rough edges went downwards, so the rougher they are, the harder it would be to get them level. Duh!
I'll take a trip there this week to compare the more expensive ones, to see how they compare. If the surface is too rough, they'd look bloody awful, as well as being capable of catching your toes/feet. Thanks Alan.
One trick with that which can help a bit is to try to sort the tiles roughly by thickness and use those of one range in one area. That makes it easier to bed them on the adhesive without too much messing around.
Take a look at Yellow Pages etc. for other places that perhaps have more stone products. There is quite a range available.
3mm or so should be OK. I wander around in bare feet quite frequently and never notice them and my wife is barefooted in the kitchen most of the time.]]
Also walking in bare feet on uneven surfaces is supposed to be good for you. Helps maintain those balance muscles at the side of your legs and helps stop you falling over when you get elderly. We are evolved to walk on uneven surfaces, not dead smooth ones.
Well, I've been to Topps and had a good look at their range. The 1 sample slate tile I had seemed to be the worst of the bunch of those available for viewing, 2 boxes were open, and all of them were 'flatter' than the one I had, though there was a large disparity in their thickness - some at ~3mm, others nearer 10mm. Apparently, these are straight from the quarry, with no machining done to them, hence the lack of any tooling marks on the 1 I had.
Viewing them was a bad move though, as we've seen some much better ones, albeit at twice the price. The cheap alternative to a new carpet has suddenly become not so cheap! Ta Alan.
As a matter of interest, what was the price/sqm. of the more expensive ones? If you are going to consider slate, then do shop around.. There is a lot of choice on the market.......
The 300mm square uncalibrated black is as hewn and in small sizes.
Visually from the photo (which is never great) the amount of lamination looks reasonable, but it does vary. basically, this one is costing £13 /sqm
The second one looks like a Chinese or possibly Indian slate. Here the story is different. They are achieving low pricing by mixing sizes. This reduces the waste (for them) on a job lot. If you were to specify 600x400 for all slates, then the price would double. For 200 square it would halve. What they are doing here is to provide a mix and an average price.. It's not a bad idea at all if you like the mix of sizes. Notice in the photo, that there isn't a fixed laying pattern either. That's OK - as somebody said to me "there are no rules with tiling" (within reason). However, remember that if there are damaged bit or pieces not to your liking, you will need to add to the waste calculation. Normally one allows 10% or so - more or large formats. Too much of that and what was a £16 tile becomes a £20 tile. Therefore look very carefully at what you are getting.
For example, I just pulled this from Stonell's pricelist. Sheng Li is a typical Chinese slate in different sizes
Sheng Li
Multi colour slate with autumnal colours, orange and greens, on a grey base..
Size Usage Shade Ex VAT Inc VAT Unit of measure
300x300x8-13 3 D £15.50 £18.21 per m2
600x300x10-15 3 D £16.13 £18.95 per m2
600x600x12-18 3 D £24.89 £29.25 per m2
You can see how much difference size makes to price. As soon as you go above 300 square, the pricing goes up.
I would start by deciding on colour types and then sizes. See if you can buy some samples on sale or return or refund against a purchase. That can be negotiatd usually. Then lay them on the floor and look at them for a few days. Wet them occasionally. I think that you will find one that you like.
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