Flooring

Setting tiles is fairly straightforward: begin at the center of the room and work your way out. Follow your working lines and keep tiles aligned with spacers. Working carefully will just about guarantee a perfect job. If you put a tile down crooked, pick it up right away and reposition it.

There’s probably never been a room yet that was tiled without any cutting. You can either make the cuts as you go along, or install all the full tiles, wait 24 hours for the adhesive to dry, then do all the cut tiles at once.

WHAT YOU'LL NEED

SKILL SCALE
Medium

TIME REQUIRED
You can set ceramic tiles in a 5x7-foot bathroom in 2 1/2 hours.

TOOLS
Notched trowel
2x4 or beater block
Rubber mallet
Sponge or cloth
China marker
Snap cutter
Safety goggles

MATERIALS
Tiles
Adhesive
Spacers

Put a little adhesive on the flat side of a square-notched trowel and apply it, pushing it into the face of the backerboard as you go. Then apply more to make a layer of adhesive roughly ½ inch thick.

 

 

 

Holding the trowel at about 70 degrees to the floor, push the teeth of the tool to the floor, making ridges of uniform height in one direction in the adhesive. The size of the trowel notches should be the same as the thickness of the tiles you’re setting.

 

 

 

Lay the first tile at the intersection of the guidelines. Twist the tile back and forth slightly to make sure it is embedded in the adhesive. As you go, remove any excess adhesive from the tiles with a damp sponge or a cloth.

 

 

 

Place the second tile alongside the first, spacing it with a couple of spacers. Continue laying tiles until you have filled up the box. Lay spacers flat in the corners where tiles meet.

 

 

 

 

Lay a short length of 2x4 or a beater block on top of the tiles and tap lightly with a rubber mallet to level the tiles and bed them firmly in the adhesive. Continue laying tiles, in one box at a time, until you reach the wall. If necessary (and it probably will be) cut tiles to fit against the wall.

 

 

 

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