I just removed the hideous pink tile floor from my master bath. 11 likes. Like the ceramic tile conversations, I’m assuming that adding some sort of substrate first is in order? Should we use plywood and cement board or can we just use plywood for the subfloor? Better to have it a little higher than deal with that kind of mess. Thank you. in homes that cost one 1 million dollars. It’s not necessary to make it fully waterproof just resistant enough so that moisture that gets through the grout joints mostly dries out back through the grout instead of through the wood. I have an old house that's built on pillars and has shifted a little over time. ( if not use self-leveling liquid cement to reach the same level to rest of the old plywood). I am concern about my door. Don’t do it. I allways use plywood, a mixture of 6m/m & 12m/m pva the surface sticks like sxit to a blanket, as long as the boxing is put in with battens and is rigid there should be no problem. Just prep the area like your life depends on it. Plywood and OSB expand and contract with humidity and temperature much more than ceramic tile. Tiling onto plywood? I’m not a pro but I’ve done about six different bathroom and kitchen floors as a fussy DIY-er. On a plywood subfloor, you need a layer of cement backer board or an underlayment membrane between the subfloor and tile for the thin-set adhesive to achieve a good bond. We would have tile jobs sometimes over 10,000 sq.ft. Fezza74 New Member. I still get calls for more work after being out of it for 10 years because my work held up. To install the first board into place, position it along the batten you measured earlier and butt the board up against the wall. grout is cracking and tile loose. Spare no expense and do it right. I am using a polymer modified mortar. How to tile onto a plywood floor. We’d do backslashes, floors, walls, etc. Thank you for all the informative posts. They are also able to strengthen a floor for tiling using a much thinner . 4: Tape joints with alkali resistant cement board tape. HOW-TO 4 LAYING HARDBOARD AND PLYWOOD 1 Use a chalk line to mark two lines at 90-degree angles to each other across the centre of the room (F2). I have luan over the top of my 5’X5′ bathroom plywood floor. Backed by his 40-year remodeling career, Danny served as the home improvement expert for CBS’s The Early Show and The Weather Channel for more than a decade. L. Leo Moderator. One – the subfloor needs to be stiff and solid. When I took the damaged tiles off, they had been put on to plywood. A contractor did that in my kitchen some years ago, and resulted in very severe cracking of the tile and grout. Plywood expands and contracts at rates different from tile; this causes cracks to develop in grout lines or tiles. I did it for 30 years over fir plywood. Hi, Julie, You may need more support for laying tile on this kind of floor. Please include a photo with your question so we can see the project area. When I walk a cross the floor in some areas the floor make noise. Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited. Try laying tile over 1/2″ Durock or Hardie and see what happens when the joists are 19.2″ or 24″ on center. While you can lay tile directly over a concrete slab using thin-set adhesive, don’t make the mistake of applying tile directly to a plywood subfloor. You can’t tile on plywood because it expands and contracts but it’s okay to put down a backer board directly on top of this plywood? Measure the floor , put tiles on it without adhesive so there is no bits to cut like 1-3 cm as it looks ugly. It doesn’t look like plywood I’ve seen with long strips of wood in it. Plywood expands and contracts at rates different from tile; this causes cracks to develop in grout lines or tiles. MF Building Services. Regards Just checking the procedure on lying down tile on wood subfloor. I am currently pulling up ceramic tile that I foolishly applied over plywood two years ago. It was in perfect condition and that bathroom was used daily for 25 years. If possible, you should always use concrete board underlayments rather than plywood. I prefer to use Hardiebacker Board for my floor projects because it is has the highest compressive and flexural strengths of any cement board in comparison to it’s weight and they offer 3’x5′ options as well as 4’x8′ options. Thin set was used instead of glue or adhesive. How to Prepare Plywood for Tile. Any thoughts? Most people do not have problems when doing tile themselves directly to plywood. When applying cement backer board over a plywood subfloor, be sure to adhere the two surfaces together with thin-set adhesive; and screw the cement backer board down with special screws that countersink into the backer board, such as Backer-On screws available at The Home Depot. I am laying pebble rock tiles over a 3/4 plywood sub floor covered with a membrane and sealed with Red Gard. The obvious drawback is that the height of the floor gets to be pretty high at times and you have to watch the height of exterior doors, etc. I too, just removed original tile from a mid 70’s house that was directly on plywood subfloor….no crack and grout was perfect, however, they did not use thinset to adhere the tile, looked like a standard construction adhesive. Two – paint the plywood with some waterproofing / crack isolation membrane. Versatile non-structural building board with a Smooth finish . The boxing in can then either be painted or tiled (or a mixture of the two as in this example.) Even if you use a waterproof underlayment membrane, the floor will still be either 1/4″ or 1/2” higher than the subfloor, plus the thickness of the tile and adhesive. I have laid tile directly over plywood and it will work in small areas but when you have big areas of tile I would use some kind of backer board. Now, I buying a townhouse in WNC with laminate flooring in kitchen, and all bathrooms. Wrong. I had to rebuilt my home after hurricanes, and the Miami-Dade county inspector loved that I was informative and passed all my inspections. Ceramic tile doesn’t expand/contract nearly as much. With that said, if there is no need to raise the area being redone in order to match up with an elevated surface in another part of the home, 1/4″ cement board is the best option. posted 51 years ago. The house is build tongue-in-groove OSB floorboards and thats it. we are thinking about having the 3/8th inch plywood torn out and replaced by 1/4 inch concrete board before the new tiles are installed. We supply trade quality DIY and home improvement products at great low prices If you want to know why- it’s because it pretty much doesn’t matter what the subfloor is under that plywood. This shoe rack is simply a shelf unit laid out with dimensions to accommodate shoes. This batten will become the inside corner of the boxing. how did people tile floors before hardieboard was invented in 1980’s? I don’t think hardieboard is necessary and think pro contractors are just trying to take advantage of you. Plywood will expand and deform if subjected to moisture or humidity. must i take up the whole floor. YES, AND NO !. To my surprise, the marble tiles were laid directly on top of this plywood without cementboard (probably because the toilet drain calls for a rear flush model, and cementboard would have disrupted where the toilet and drain met). *And check out Instagram and Pinterest pages! My shortcut really cost me. First ply needs to be screwed to the floorboards and then painted with pva prior to tiling. You can have 5/8 OSB and 19.2″ OC joists and it still works. On a plywood subfloor, you need either a layer of cement backer board or an underlayment membrane, like Custom Building Products’ Wonderboard and RedGard, between the subfloor and tile for the thin-set adhesive to achieve a good bond. Uh oh! Do your homework before making these comments. Regular seasonal humidity shifts are significant enough to make the average 10′ x 10′ wood subfloor floor expand or contract as much as 1/2″. Discussion in 'Tilers' Talk' started by Fezza74, Feb 10, 2015. Wow, reading horror stories. For wall tiling applications it is essential that the wall itself has sufficient inherent strength to hold the proposed tile and the adhesive being used. If we do use cement board and plywood I’m guessing we’ll have to use a thinset in between the two and then screw the cement board with a countersink. The following chart lists the accepted maximum loadings for a variety of wall substrates. Thu, Jan 1, 1970 12:00 AM. The wood on all the floors is like particle board–it looks like pressed sawdust and absorbs moisture like a sponge. I want to put tile on plywood floors, and I hear all the arguments for putting something over it. I’m gonna put ceramic tile on a coffee table, I put 1/4 plywood on top of the table then putting the ceramic tile on top of that, so it should be ok, I live in a mobile home and it has carpet and would like to remove and put tile down. Glad I got out just when all of these new products came in. Been doing it for 15 years with no complaints from any customers. or plywood. My question is whether or not I can replace the rotted subfloor with a thinner plywood and then cementboard to meet the current subfloor height, or am I in over my head with this fix? ANSWER ANSWER - We normally don’t recommend to bonding to exterior glued plywood (EGP), but it can be done in interior dry applications. I’ve had good results with tile set in thin set on plywood as long as I get two things taken care of. I am a pen-pusher and work in an office. Apparently something of a no no, but has anyone tiled onto MDF successfully? Then stick the cut ones. Is backer board really necessary? Try that with tile over cement board and see what happens. We have our large kitchen and hallway that was originally covered by 12 X 12 ceramic tiles on top of 3/8th inch plywood. No other substrate of any kind on top of that. Thank you. I have a concrete floor and I put plywood over it , can I install granite tile on the plywood. My question though is about the KIND of plywood I have. *Zero* cracked tiles, *zero* cracks in the grout. We are down to the bottom layer of plywood and it dips on one side of the room (8"x 15" room) and then kind of comes back up. If the floor needs to be “made good”, i.e. All rights reserved. Please do not tile directly over plywood. We show you how to construct a simple box section that hides your pipework that you can then decorate so that it blends in seamlessly with the rest of your decor. You have entered an incorrect email address! We are redoing 230 square feet of tile in our front hallway. Even if it were particle board I’d surely think something would be advisable rather than risk having to tear up subfloor someday. In this project we show you how to box in pipes such as waste pipes and central heating pipes. Once had to remove the above to get at a leak from an existing compression fitting which I hadn't put in, it was too difficult to remove the tiles from the plywood, had to use new to rebox in. Make sure the batten you installed earlier is on the inside of the boxing, near to the pipes. I’m afraid of applying the carpet glue directly to that one-and-only layer of flooring. While plywood is not recommended as a wall substrate for the direct fixing of tiles, the advice for floor tiling remains the same as per BS 5385 Part 3: 2014. Putting up wallpaper has never been easier thanks to our range of self-adhesive wallpaper and tiles that are now available at Dunelm. The plywood must be WBP/Marine grade screwed down at 300mm centres. How to Fix a Buzzing or Humming Dimmer Switch, Winter Care For Outdoor Flower Containers, Beautiful, Affordable Storage Solutions for Every Room, https://www.facebook.com/todayshomeownermedia/, https://www.instagram.com/todayshomeowner/, https://www.pinterest.com/todayshomeowner/pins/, https://todayshomeowner.com/radio/tile-underlayment/, How to Build a Floor to Ceiling Shoe Rack, Building a Pocket Park in Marianna, Florida (Part 1), SimpleMat Contractor Roll Makes Backsplash Installations Easier. 3 Adjust it so that the edges do not correspond with the gaps between the floorboards. Use a good acrylic sealer, use 2 coats of it, then put on a tanking system as it’s flexible. As the plywood or OSB expands, the ceramic won’t. Installing cement board is necessary to waterproof ceramic tile floors. But here’s an alternative: https://todayshomeowner.com/radio/tile-underlayment/ Hi in this video I am tiling the wooden floor . If you are intending to tile the boxing in then I would recommend using external WBP plywood to ensure a good bond between the tiles and the wood. No matter how firm the subfloor; the plywood will expand and contract at a different rate as the tile, causing cracks to develop in the grout lines or tiles over time. Can you please provide advice? It is a good idea to put half inch plywood underlay to strengthen the floor before using modified thin set to put the tile directly on wood. It's a window reveal in a kitchen. The nice thing about tiling over plywood is that, should you drop something and break a tile, you can remove it without disturbing the surrounding tiles. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Joseph. Did I create a bigger problem for myself?? It is ideal for floors which my be susceptible to deflection or lateral movement, such as … I have one room in new construction where I want to lay CARPET tiles. Hi, Mary, The area is 5×5, so I am not too concerned with some of the fears I have read about in the previous posts. contractor laid tile on plywood floor board how can i fix. Thanks! Area Covered I live in the lovely village of Chipping Ongar, in Essex, in between Brentwood, Chigwell, Chelmsford and Epping. Please, as a homeowner do not trust anyone with your home without doing your research first. I it is a 18 mm exterior plywood that is suitable for bathrooms. (https://www.instagram.com/todayshomeowner/ and https://www.pinterest.com/todayshomeowner/pins/), And we always appreciate when our fans tell their friends about the practical home improvement advice they receive from “Today’s Homeowner.”. 2: Place Hardiebacker in staggered pattern so no four corners meet. I know the subfloor must be really sturdy but because of the size of the tile I’m worried that overtime they may break? I am not a professional but I do all my own work and own 3 rental properties Now the entire flooring of ceramic tiles needs to be torn out and replaced. When in doubt add blocking in the joists (if you can get at them) and more screws in the subfloor to make sure. I put 6mm marine ply on my wooden floor boards and screwed it down every 6 inches. So yes, you can rule on ply. The use of a plywood subfloor topped by cement backer board has made tiling much easier today than when I started my remodeling career. Tiling on mdf.... J. Jim K.. I plan to have travertine tiles in mud room and half bath, the tiles that need to be removed are 1 inch thick laid directly to plywood 20 years ago, should cement backer board be used first? This article was informative. I felt this wasn’t right which led me to here, but i suppose it’s too late now. I have gone behind numerous tile setters to remedy their work when they thought (as many of the others that are commenting here) that using thinset under 1/2″ Durock (over 3/4″ OSB) provided a sturdy substrate. When tiling onto plywood overlaid timber we recommend using a flexible adhesive (S1) such as Topps Tiles Rapid Set Flexible, BAL Rapid-Flex Fibre or BAL Flex Fibre. At first I thought putting plywood down before tiling would suffice but then I was told that plaster board might be needed cause the plywood might not be strong enough. Needless to say, the tile has cracked and the grout lines have cracked for the 2nd time (this was only 4 months ago and he’s already been back out here 1 time and will be coming back out again). If that’s the case, the backer board will shift loose over the same period of time due to the ply expanding and contracting, even if it’s screwed down. I’ve never had a problem repairing broken tile on cement board. 3: Fasten Hardiebacker 1/4″ board with corrosion resistant screws or galvanized roofing nails 8 inches apart. This location is very handy for the A414, M11 and M25. They suck to work with and common sense was never a factor in their designs. It ALWAYS works. I had carpet down on a concrete slab floor and I was wanting to put tile down but I was wanting to find a cheap and easy way to put the tile down quickly. Start by measuring the room. Yes for a quick solution, but I recommend you find the correct or approx thickness of the plywood to replace this area. His extensive hands-on experience and understanding of the industry make him the go-to source for all things having to do with the home – from advice on simple repairs, to complete remodels, to helping homeowners prepare their homes for extreme weather and seasons. Use a Hardie board/cement backer no mater what the time/labor/cost/floor height. I always thought plywood would hold the tiles and ensure there's no movement. For wall installations, plywood is overkill beneath the concrete or fiber board, which is designed in five-eighths inch material for wall settings. Hi in this video I am tiling the wooden floor . *Like us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DannyLipford If I had the time to be meticulous, I’d open pandora’s box and do the whole thing right- But I dont. There are thin-set dry set mortars design specifically for adhering ceramic tile to plywood that is designated as an ANSI A118.11 thin-set mortar. It was layed directly onto the plywood subfloor – 25 years ago. 2 Loose lay the first board over the centre with its long edges at 90 degrees to the floorboards. If painting, then I would recommend MDF as it … Is there a pro or con in adding different size tiles? Thanx, hello, 1: Trowel out bed of unmodified thinset over wooden subfloor. Hey, Read, research, and make sure the licenced contractor knows his/her stuff. We are using 12×24″ tile. Let’s be honest here.