Starting to Tile

Today Kyle and Dave started tiling the floors, with the full bath on the ground floor as their first task.  Cement board was put down a couple days ago — tile needs a stable substrate.  Kyle then spread and combed a bed of thinset, buttered the back of a porcelain tile, and positioned it in the mortar. Then another, then another.  Plastic spacers are used to ensure even separation between tiles.  These spaces between tiles will be filled with grout.  After a few weeks I'll go back and seal the grout.  This will prevent dirt from changing the grout's color.

Kyle starts at the exterior door and works his way north.

To fit around pipes and the ends of walls, the tile has to be cut.  This requires a wet-cutting tile saw with a diamond blade.  Dave and Kyle took their turns with this formidable piece of equipment.

"Measure once, cut twice."  Dave makes sure his measurements
are correct and the cut lines are square.

Kyle freehands a tile cut.

As Kyle explains, you have to plan your work so 1) you don't disturb the tiles you've just set and 2) you don't paint yourself into a corner.

Spreading the thinset.

Plumbing is a challenge.

Tile also has to slip underneath the casings around doors.  To accomplish this Kyle uses a flat handsaw to shave a quarter inch or so off the bottom of the trim wood.  This double-edged saw probably has a technical name, but for our purposes, just call it "the whippy-whippy saw."

The whippy-whippy nibbles away at the door casing.

Laying tile is slow work.  But at the end of the day, you have a handsome bathroom floor!  Well, almost — a few more tiles will complete this room, and then it's on to the next space!

A (nearly) finished bathroom floor.

Fired tile has been used as a construction material since the third millennium BC.  Porcelain tile is used in many types of construction today because of its durability.  This bathroom floor should still look good long after I've gone to dust and glory. •••