Project 22: Fixing the Bubble in Our Tile Floor - Part 4

This is part four of a previously discussed project. Catch up on parts one, two and three here.

Last I left you, my kitchen floor looked like this:

Well, my husband and father in law took on the next leg of the project. Upon careful inspection they realized that a few more of the tiles were starting to pop up and needed to be replaced while we were at it. So poor LJ had to drive all the way back to Spring and buy seven more tiles. They got back and had to break up and clear away the tile and mortar. Suffice it to say they used the correct tool... a chisel bit on a rotary hammer drill. 

When everything was cleared away they laid out the new tiles to see how they would fit together. A couple of them needed to be cut with a tile saw to fit along the edges.

This is what a tile saw looks like:

See how clean the cuts are? 

The tile saw has an area at the bottom for water. The blade has to spin super fast to get these nice clean cuts through the tile, so the water helps cool the blade off. It looks like of crazy to me. The thought of putting water inside of a power tool seems a little strange.

Next they mixed the mortar. Here is the mortar that they purchased:

To mix this you need three 5 gallon buckets. In the first bucket you put your mortar mix, the other two are for water. You also need something to mix the mortar. That's what this tool is for:

Crazy looking, isn't it? The mortar mixer is actually on a drill bit that can be connected to a power drill. Man, drills are so useful! Anyway, you mix the mortar adding water from one of the buckets periodically until the mortar is the right consistency (or scientifically speaking - not too thick and not too thin).

Here's what it looks like when it's the right consistency:

After you're done you'll need to clean of your mortar mixer. That's what the last bucket of water is for. Just put the mixer into the bucket and turn it on. The mortar should come right off. At least, it will if you do this right away. If you wait longer I don't know if it's as easy to clean.

Once your mortar is ready it is time to lay the tile. It's best to set yourself up with a bucket of mortar and a bucket of water with a sponge. The water and sponge can be used to add more water to the mortar of you realize your consistency is wrong, or it can be used to clean mortar off of anything that gets messy.

Speaking of tools, you'll also need a regular trowel, like this:

And a square notched trowel:

And then a bunch of little spacers:

They laid in the first few tiles in the closet, lining the new tiles up with the existing tiles. This was hard to see so I'll just show you how it looked when the closet was done:

Here's how they laid the rest:

First you use the regular trowel to slather mortar over the portion you're working on. Remember, if you're doing a large section only apply mortar to the area you're working on. You don't want to spread it everywhere and then find you can't reach the corner or something. 

Once the mortar is down it's time to used the notched side of the square notched trowel to comb through the mortar creating rows. The tiles get placed on top of these rows of mortar.

It's better to have a little too much mortar than too little. If you have too much you just scrape it up using the trowels and dump it back in your bucket.

The area on our floor was so small that tile spacers weren't really necessary to keep everything in the right spot. But normally use use them to keep all the tiles equally distant from one another, like this:

Photo from receipefordistraction.blogspot.com

Another use, which the guys did take advantage of, is to use the spacer to clean out any extra mortar that squeezes out between the tiles. They scraped the spacer down each tile line, cleaning out any mortar it displaced.

The mortar has to set for 24 hours. So, all they had left that day was to clean up. It's important to clean up the mortar before it hardens. Not only do you need to spray down your tools, but if you worked in your driveway it's important to clean that too. I have to tell you, it seems really weird to spray a power tool with water...

The cost for this step was pretty cheap for us. All we had to do was buy the mortar and tiles. It comes in handy to have a parent that just recently re-tiled his entryway and therefore has all the tools needed for the job. We spent $25 on the mortar, and we have plenty left over for a future job. The ten tiles we bought cost about $25 as well.

This project is concluded in part 5.