Planning kitchen floor tile project


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Old 12-24-18, 01:08 AM
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Planning kitchen floor tile project

Wife and I are on the same page- we have had a laminate floor since we bought the house two years ago and it is already starting to peel. Replacing it would be a mistake and we just don’t want to have an ongoing project replacing laminate sections every year. We want to replace it with ceramic tile. Not a huge job, estimated around 200 sq. Ft. The floor is stable- no squeaks nor creaks. House is ca. 1717- very old. Do I need to do any floor prep once I pull up the laminate? Special cleaners to remove adhesives or anything? Should I add concrete board on top of the subfloor? I’m not worried about the floor height- dishwasher has plenty of adjustment and I am going to run and expansion joint with shoe molding or something around the edge. Any suggestions?
 
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Old 12-24-18, 11:46 PM
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What's the composition of the remaining floor after the laminate is removed? What's the size, spacing and unsupported span of the structure beneath the floor?
I would doubt a house that old would have been built to support tile but who knows what's been done since then?
 
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Old 12-25-18, 03:27 AM
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At the minimum you will need to cover the floor with some type of tile friendly sheeting like Hardie Backer or cement board. The tile backer will be screwed down to your subfloor so it doesn't need to have all the glue removed but you do want it smooth and flat.
 
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Old 12-25-18, 05:55 AM
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I would doubt a house that old would have been built to support tile but who knows what's been done since then?
On the other hand , some of those old structures were over built with wood members that are oversize by today's standards.
 
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Old 12-25-18, 05:50 PM
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You MUST put thinset under the CBU and on top of it too.
 
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Old 12-25-18, 08:16 PM
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Few floors of that vintage were built to today's standards for tile. If they were tiled, it was a 1 1/4" mudbed designed to take the abuse of everyday use. So, to tile to today's standards would require different specifics. Most likely those that your house is not set up for.
 
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Old 12-26-18, 04:14 AM
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Specifics on tiling

what would I need to check for? Are we talking about installing additional joists under the subfloor, replacing the subfloor with something thicker... the putting down thinset then CBU then thinset then tile? I don’t know the layers but the floor is on some sort of framing that sits over a crawl space- I can see it from the top and I can see it from the bottom but I cannot see what’s in between.
 
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Old 12-26-18, 04:53 AM
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What you need to do depends on how your floor is constructed. There are many guides online with advice on what support is appropriate for a tile floor. You can crawl underneath and see the size of your floor joists, how far they are spaced apart and how far they span. Then if you have floor registers you can pull up a grate and see the cross section of your floor sheeting.
 
 

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