Help!: Tiles Changing Colour

[tay1974]

Hi Everyone,

Tiled a bathroom couple of months ago and the customer has now called me and advised that 7 of the tiles on the bottom row around the bath have changed colour from the original while/grey colour to dark grey.....

I popped round there to have a look and it is true. She tells me it started with 5 tiles and has now gone to 7 tiles. The tiles were from homebase and I used Bal Grip/White star adhesive and Bal grout, plus I siliconed around the bath.

What could have caused this problem? A bad batch of tiles or something else?

Thanks
Paul

[david campbell]

it sounds as if water is getting in behind the tiles,what kind of tiles are they?i.e porcelain,travertine?

[diamondtiling]

Those white tiles from homebase are pretty naff, they are very thin and when wet they seem to go darker, I fitted a few and thought they had dark dots on them, it turned out to be my wet fingers. You say that the tiles are around the top of the bath? is water getting behind them and the biscuit is sucking it up and changing colour, it has to be water.

[diamondtiling]

I will guess they are the little 150mm white ceramics?

[jay]

take it its a shower over the bath ////////

[david campbell]

I will guess they are the little 150mm white ceramics?

even there larger 300 x 200mm matt finished are the same diamond

[diamondtiling]

they are so naff, I thought I was seeing things with the dots on them, when I pointed them out to my mate he was not bothered, different sizes and shades, no batch numbers on the boxes, I told him NEVER to say to anyone that I had tiled it otherwise I would post pics of him on youtube that his missus would not like..............

[tay1974]

They were the 20 x 25cm ceramic tiles.

[tay1974]

How can water get in if the grout is all ok and also silicone is around the bottom to seal the bath to the tiles?

It has only happended to 7 of the tiles the remailing tiles at the bottom, say another 15 are all ok.

[GirlRacerRed]

Hi Everyone,

Tiled a bathroom couple of months ago and the customer has now called me and advised that 7 of the tiles on the bottom row around the bath have changed colour from the original while/grey colour to dark grey.....

I popped round there to have a look and it is true. She tells me it started with 5 tiles and has now gone to 7 tiles. The tiles were from homebase and I used Bal Grip/White star adhesive and Bal grout, plus I siliconed around the bath.

What could have caused this problem? A bad batch of tiles or something else?

Thanks
Paul

to me at first, this sounded like water getting in behind the tiles and seeping into the tiles.

How can water get in if the grout is all ok and also silicone is around the bottom to seal the bath to the tiles?

It has only happended to 7 of the tiles the remailing tiles at the bottom, say another 15 are all ok.

you'll need to check that the grout and silicone are all ok before you can be really sure it's a bad batch.

does the customer have any spare tiles? would it be worth chipping out the 7 offenders and replacing?

[diamondtiling]

Is there a shower over the bath? if so then water could be getting behind the tiles at a higher point than you would expect, it trickles down and has to stop at the bottom tiles and that is why they are wet and dark, If you remove those tiles I am pretty sure you will find damp walls.

[brian c]

did you allow the adhesive time to dry out before grouting?

[tay1974]

Yeah the adhesive had 24 hours to dry.

[Dave]

It is just water ingression through the grout joints..and then wetting the biscuit of the tiles...

It needs to dry out and then use a grout sealer to help repel the water from the joint.

If that doesn't work then maybe a re-grout with epoxy will prevent wetting the biscuit..

Does the glaze go right to the edge of the tile..?

[diamondtiling]

Not disagreeing with you Dave but why is it just at the bottom row of tiles? they are poor quality and the glaze is a problem.

[Dave]

It's where the water runs lowest and then ingresses...loads of posts on here about the same scenario.....like water setteling on the bath edge and then soaking into the joints and into the tiles biscuit which then soaks water like a sponge and slowly going up over the more wet it gets as it never gets chance to dry out...

[Dave]

In other words..cheap tiles like you mentioned..

Also another suggestion was weak glazing and this allows water to ingress...

[tay1974]

No the glaze did not go over the edges of the tiles.

Am i as the tiler to blame for this problem, or is it becasue the tiles were cheap?

I thought I had done everything correctly, used Bal White Star, grouted and sealed with silicone. What else can you do.

[Dave]

Is the grout flush with the tile face or slightly recessed..?