Greetings all, been a while since I have been here… I am in the process of tiling our kitchen countertops. We are using 4″ tile with roundovers for the edges & double round-overs for the corners. I am laying them on two layers of 3/4″ exterior grade ply.
My question is this: Do I tile the edges or top first? If the top, by how much should the edge & corner tiles extend past the ply to end up flush with the tiles that will be on the edges of the counter? If I do the edges first, how much do I drop the edge tiles down to create the necessary grout line?
Or did I just answer my own question?
Pondering in Victoria
David
Replies
There's a book on this web site under 'Book's and Video's" called "Tiling counter top's". I have one of the authors other books on tiling. I have grown to appreciate the taunton books for filling in the blanks as I try to be a jack of all trades when it comes to my house.
Marc
I don't think it really matters a lot. I would tend to do the top first because the thickness of the thinset is fixed by the trowel all over the top. You can play with the amount of thinset behind the edge tiles a little easier because the area is so small. Your layout has to be close, but you'll get a bit more adjustability on the edge than on the top.
Plywood is not the best surface for tiling. All grout is porous, even when sealed, and moisture will wick into the grout and be in contact with the wood. You're better off with the top layer being 1/2" plywood with 1/4" Hardie Backer as the top surface. It gets attached to the plywood with thinset mortar and screws about every 6" along the edge and 8" in the field.