My parents are planning to tile their sunroom sometime this summer. It should be a pretty simple job, as the room has a nice flat concrete floor, and seems to be pretty square, too. The only real concern I have is the point where the metal sunroom walls meet the floor, as they are attached directly to the concrete with no curb or anything like that. The tile will thus rise above the bottom of the walls. How would you handle a joint like that? I’d guess you wouldn’t want to grout it, but then, what the heck do I know!
did
Unencumbered by knowledge or fear…
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A pic, for some clarity:
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did
Unencumbered by knowledge or fear...
Caulk. You need something flexible at that joint.
Experienced, but still dangerous!
And you can get caulk from the grout manufacturer that'll match the color grout they chose.
You've got a couple of choices.
Option (1) Buy 'baseboard' tile to match the floor tile; it's available for some choices, but by no means all. Usually it will be 3-4" high and the same width as the main floor tiles (assuming they're 8x8 or more), and one long edge will be quarter-round, which avoids the need for a tile moulding.
Option (2) Cut floor tiles into 3- or 4-inch high x tile-width pieces. If your using 8x8's or better, you can get two pieces from each floor tile. Set the cut edge down into the space between the floor tile and the wall, and grout that joint when you grout the floor. You cap the top edge of the 'baseboard' with a plastic or metal tile moulding, available from your tile supplier. This moulding has an open-work flange that slides behind the tile and is trapped between it and the wall in the glue or mud; the visible part of the moulding just 'caps' the exposed edge of the tile. Then, if you want, you can lay a thin bead of caulk into the corner between the moulding and the wall; it's not usually necessary for looks.
Either of these options will protect the base of the wall from mop-water damage. If you've got good reason to suspect that there'll be movement between the metal wall and the concrete slab (I can't see why there should be, but I don't know the whole situation), you might want to try something else: commercial vinyl base strip, the kind you see in hospitals and schools built since real tile work became too expensive for public budgets. It's not particularly æsthetic, but it's easy to glue on and it'll repel that mop water while hiding the joint. In that case, you don't grout the wall-floor joint; just caulk it.
Dinosaur
'Y-a-tu de la justice dans ce maudit monde?
How about a terrazo strip?
If you're patient, crumbs and crud will do the job. Faster if you have dogs or kids.
Joe H
Dinosour saved me a lot of typing.
BAseboard in one form or another.....tile baseboard or wood.
Will make the job look pristine to boot,
Forget caulk......how do you spell uggly again? and who was it here that said caulk aint trim?
Be a fine home builder
Namaste
andy
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