Greetings –
Years ago when I was in the tile trade, we used to get 1×1 and 2×2 ceramic mosaic tiles ‘face’ mounted. That is, with a sheet of paper glued to the top face of the tile with a water soluable glue that you’d just wet with a sponge and peel off during installation. These days, all I can locate locally (in the immediate Seattle area) is material from Dallas Ceramics (Dal Tile) and when I described this to the counter person, she thought I was nuts.
Well, believe me, the adults were not around when they came up with this rubber dot mounting scheme that seems to all that’s available from Dal Tile! I tried it on our downstairs shower and it’s the pits to work with. The sheets are *not* perfect and making any adjustments is next to impossible. Trim shapes are not the same length as either the short or long edge of the sheets (12×24 sheets of 2×2 tile).
In short, the question is, does anyone know if anyone tile mfr still offers face mounted ceramic mosaic tile? I would like to use 2×2 ceramics on another shower we’re building but I will *not* use the rubber dot stuff ever, ever, never again!! (grin)
Thanks for any leads.
Incidentally, I found a factory outlet for American Olean, one of my previous favorite tile mfrs. but lo’ and beholdm, it appears to be a division of Dal Tile as well!
Thanks for any leads on this product.
Replies
2 weeks ago I came across the same tile configuration. Different mfg.
That stuff sucks. You didn't mention out of square.
9 square feet of shower base. Impossible to get it right.
Late 50's early 60's you could get half by half mesh back up to 3x3's. 12x24's.
Number crunchers. Wanna bet.
Don't know of any mfgs that aren't doing it that way.
3'x3' is harder and more expensive to ship I bet, doesnt fall neatly onto a palletNever be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark, Professional build the Titanic.
Inches... Not 1.875 diamonds up the tape.
This isn't going to help much but anyhow...
I saw a product a while back where people could make there own mosaic sheets, don't know where or who.
Takes time to make them, but I guess the time actually setting them would be less...
Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark, Professional build the Titanic.
Follow up -
I called the Dal Tile factory in Texas and asked an installation tech about the availability of face mounted ceramic mosaics. He, of course, had never heard of such a thing but looked it up and for sure, there are 'other' mounting options available.
When looking at the product number for a specific porcelain or ceramic mosaics, part of the suffix letters indicate the type of mounting. If you specify "PM" (for paper mount), this evidently indicates the type of paper face mount I was looking for.
That's the good news.
The bad news is that it's not stocked at the factory and as I mentioned originally, my local outlet thought I was kidding when I described it. Thus it's a special order.
For something like a shower it may well be out of the financial question. But I'll see.
Don't give up the ship!!
Dennis in Bellevue WA
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