Bathroom Floor - Tile

Happy Thanksgiving!

I installed the floor tile in the bathroom today. Doing the tile and grout this long weekend gives the floor enough time to set and cure so that the shower can be used on Monday morning.

The first thing I did was to cut and layout the tile sheets (I rented a tile saw from Home Depot). I lined the tile up along the center line from the sink to the toilet. Sadly, that line is not parallel to the tub. Oh, well. Next time I install a tub I'll make sure my old house walls are not only plumb but perpendicular to one another.

Here's a photo of the tile sheets laid out on the floor. We chose to use a 1" white porcelain hex tile. The tiles come on mesh sheets that are 10"x12". The glue that holds the tiles to the mesh seems to be water based because the tiles let go when they get really wet. This means that they let go sometimes when being cut on the tile saw. They also let go after they've been sitting in the thin-set for a while (which isn't a problem, just interesting). It's not a good idea to lift up an entire sheet after you've set it in the mortar.

I used a 1/4" V notch trowel to spread the thin-set mortar. It took a little while to get the hang of getting the thin-set to spread at the right thickness. The fact that I was working on top of Ditra moisture barrier made this process a little harder for me that I think it would have been otherwise.

I also didn't use tile spacers because these tiles seems to be 3/32" apart instead of 1/16" or 1/8". They didn't have 3/32" spacers at the store and the tile guy said the 1/8" would work (but they don't). That's okay since I can see 1/32" discrepancies and can make adjustments. One of the perks of being an anal retentive product designer.

Here's a photo of the finished installation. The mortar will set overnight and I'll grout tomorrow. Probably in the afternoon.