Tiling the kitchen floor
It’s been a while between posts, I’ve downed tools for most of the summer. But it’s back on. There’s a lot of jobs around the house waiting to be done, the most pressing of which was the raw particle board floor in the kitchen.
Princess Susan opted for a nice 400mm ceramic tile, off white with a marbley pattern through. These babies have been sitting in the garage for too long now, so it’s time to put ‘em to bed.
First up, we sanded the floor thoroughly with 40grit discs to remove the soaked in spills and grease. This job totally sucked, as it was rough on the back, and my back didn’t need any roughness after riding the 110klm Blayney to Bathurst bicycle race the day before… then driving 18 billion klm home with my mate Harald straight after (8 hours). Read more about the ride at cycleswr.com…
After sanding, I laid out the tiles, making all necessary cuts before any glue was mixed. This task took quite a while, with many cuts. I probably could have done it differently for less cuts, but I’m happy… so BACK OFF all you Mr Knowitalls out there.
The next job was to glue the bastards down using Amberflex, a 2 part tile adhesive suitable for timber or particle board substrates. This is severely smelly shit, and is very hard to get off your skin, so use gloves. I opted for a 10mm notched trowel with which to slap the aforementioned shit down. 3mm spacers kept everything neat. Then we hit a snag. Not enough adhesive. FUCK. Can’t finish today. Oh well. FUCK.
Princess Susan made the mercy dash down to Port Macquarie first thing Thursday Morning to get more smelly sticky shit (umm, tile glue), whilst I kept busy… yawning and stretching. After the last bunch went down, it was time for a beer… or ninety three…
Well, the glue’s dry, it’s been 24 hours, time for groutage. Slip slop slap, in goes the grout, my knees and back are killing me, how do those fuckers do this every day for years?? Here’s a photo, sorry bout the crack…
All done, looks great but needs a wipe down. I took this photo 5 minutes ago, we need to wait a day before wiping off all of the grout remnants. I’ll stuff an image of the finished floor down the wire when I get one.
And here it is. Monday night, after Spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. Note also the colour added to some of the walls.
Next up, finish those freakin floor boards and/or do the splash back in glossy black tiles.