Hi, I have just looked at a kitchen floor that has been down only for 2 years and tiles are lifting. The floor is in a 1930's house and is a suspended floor there is no vertical movement in the floor however when I lifted a tile the floorboards had been covered with ply and there was movement between this and the original floorboards so this is the reason the tiles a delaminating. I could not see any screws so I think the ply had not been fixed well. Initially I will be seeing if I can make repairs considering the tiles are coming up cleanly (at least the ones I saw). I was going to use Keraflex adhesive but saw Keraquick is more flexible, if I can get the tiles up in the bad area I will replace the ply and seriously screw it down. So which adhesive would be best?

2 part flexible adhesive, but this is a quick fix....you will encounter the same problem with de-bonding tiles as time goes by.......Gaz

Same as Gaz, Rip up and start again

I'm with the guys above, you need to do the whole floor again with, obviously, the correct preparation.

With regards to the adhesive, my understanding of the the difference is that Keraflex is more flexible but slow setting. Keraquick is not as flexible but rapid setting.

The Keraquick with latex plus can be fixed to chipboard

Thanks guys went to the job and all the tiles came up with vitually no adhesive on the back of the tiles although you could see they had been attached by the trowel marks. The 6mm plywood was screwed down with 40 screws on about 4 sq/mtrs so there was a lot of movement between the floor and the ply so I think the tiles were under stress from day one. I would guess that the adhesive was not fully set before the movement started and the tiles debonded the Grout was the only thing that kept them from moving earlier. I screwed the ply at 6" centers and the whole thing became solid the client said the floor felt firmer than when it was first done.
Thanks again

Originally Posted by waterfd

Thanks guys went to the job and all the tiles came up with vitually no adhesive on the back of the tiles although you could see they had been attached by the trowel marks. The 6mm plywood was screwed down with 40 screws on about 4 sq/mtrs so there was a lot of movement between the floor and the ply so I think the tiles were under stress from day one. I would guess that the adhesive was not fully set before the movement started and the tiles debonded the Grout was the only thing that kept them from moving earlier. I screwed the ply at 6" centers and the whole thing became solid the client said the floor felt firmer than when it was first done.
Thanks again

Sorry are you saying you rescrewed the 6mm ply or did you replace it to standard?

Kev

Were the tiles porcelain or ceramic tiles?

The floor below the ply is 1" floor boards and there was no vertical movement. The ply was in good condition and was not damaged by the removal of the tiles so it was rescrewed. The tiles were ceramic and when the adhesive residue was removed looked like new. I used Palace multiflex in the end and Ardex flexible floor grout.

i might have been good to lay thicker ply while you were at it.

I would have but there were levels with dishwasher etc that would have caused problems should they need to be removed at a later date.

Had a similar one recently, tiles came up clean, adhesive didn't want to come off the ply. No clearance under the worktops for appliances so I bonded and screwed 6mm No More Ply. Much better substrate and won't rot if it gets wet.

Tiles coming off concrete clean has been a regular one too. Baffled by some of them as getting the tiles up with fingers was easy but 2 hours with a breaker to get the adhesive off the concrete is not fun...