Laundry reno

[Mathy]

I’ve started on the laundry as the tile removal is the most daunting. It’s 1.45m x 1.2m - a small space that has a folding door to hide it.

Unfortunately, I didn’t take great “before” pictures. Basically, I’m removing all of the tiles, the sink and the folding doors. The doors are going because they limit the usefulness of the space. I’m not moving the plumbing

The start - these mosaics are grouted with Mission Brown!

I’ve finished taking mosaics off the walls. I bought a cheap wood chisel set, and used them to knock the tiles off the wall. It’s clear (now) that the bottom half of the wall hasn’t been hard plastered.

I thought I would use some Davco render to get myself a smooth surface for re-tiling. Chose Davco, because I’m going to use one of their tile glues.

Does anyone have thoughts on whether this is a good/bad idea?

It’s not obvious from this photo, but rust is a major problem in my place, and I’m going to have to cut the trough fixings off with an angle grinder, as they’re rusted in.

So, this is going to have gloss white tiles on the walls (250x450) and hopefully, porcelain grey aggregate on the floor - 600x300 if I can get the fall sorted out.

I started here because I want to put a full width bench in here, with a Stone Coat Epoxy finish - which I also plan to use in the kitchen - so this is for practice. 

More to come as this progresses, cheers

[Jason]

Hi again Deb (@Mathy)

Let me tag a couple of our resident tiling experts in @gippslandhome and @ProjectPete who might be able to assist regarding your question about the render.

Looking forward to see how your renovation work progresses. 

Jason

[gippslandhome]

Thank you @Jason  for passing on the details for @Mathy 

Hi and thank you for the opportunity to help answer some questions in regards to your laundry renovation. Sounds exciting and a nice choice of tiles. 

Could I please ask a question. Your render you are talking about, how thick is it? And was it a cement render?

Once you are able to provide those questions I can help you further..

Thank you

Kind regards Rob 👍

[gippslandhome]

Hi @Mathy 

Could I also check, by the picture I'm not sure if you're tiling onto cement Sherrie plasterboard, or it is actually bricks or blockwork.

Or is it actually tile glue you are referring to when you say render.

Thank you Deb. All the best

Kind regards Rob 👍

[Mathy]

Hi @gippslandhome - yes, it’s not the greatest photo lol. What you can see is the remains of cement based tile adhesive and the render. My place is double brick, and my previous experience has been tiling on VillaBoard/Gyprock. I’m thinking to knock the rest of the adhesive off, and then use a Davco render to smooth things out, that is, use it as a filler - so would be max of 4mm in some places - sort of a skim coat. However, I’ve read elsewhere of people using tiling adhesive to do the same job - I guess the advantage would be better sticking power? Or, am I’m going to have to use something like Bondcrete with the render? I’m concerned about that substrate sucking the moisture out of the tiling adhesive, cheers Deb

[gippslandhome]

Hi Deb, the best option I would recommend is to do as you suggested and knock off the loose tile adhesive and loose render.

Personally I would then use a primer. Don't use bondcrete. Bondcrete was used years ago when polymers were different. The polymers in modern glues react with Bondcrete and can cause adhesive failure.

Bunnings will have a standard primer. Use this as the directions suggest on all the areas to be tiled. Being only 4mm render thickness I would avoid trying to use a render as it can be hard to get it to hold at that thickness unless you have had experience rendering.

I would suggest getting a 4mm notch trowel and trowel the glue all over the wall as neatly as possible.

Let the glue dry overnight. The next morning mix up some glue and with the smooth edge of the notch trowel back fill all the voids.

Essentially what you have done is created a 4 mm bed of flat glue.

When it all dries you can rub off any high spots with a brick or the edge of your trowel.

When you are ready to tile you don't need to prime the surface just tile straight over using the same glue as previous.

Please feel free at any stage of your project to come back with questions.

All the best.

Kind regards Rob 👍😁

[Mathy]

@gippslandhome Excellent Rob, thank you. Davco Primer and Tile adhesive it is then, cheers Deb

[gippslandhome]

Your welcome @Mathy 

Kind regards Rob 👍

[Mathy]

So, I’ve finally got the Laundry to this state

The next step is to grind the floor down, because I took off 5mm thick mosaics, and I’m adding 9.8mm porcelain tiles. Also, this floor has a wicked fall to that floor drain, so bad, I can’t even level my washing machine. So, I’ve purchased a Dual Row Cup Grinding Wheel for my angle grinder. Next problem is the amount of dust this is going to create, so I built a DIY dust extractor (which I haven’t tried yet) from a hack I found on YouTube.

This is the view from above,  on the left hand side is the  nozzle from my Workshop Vac ......

This is the view from underneath with the grinding disk attached.

Basically this is built out of a plastic Uni Pro paint bucket lid, a piece of plumbing pipe rubber insulation and a lot of Gaffa tape - found this idea at  https://youtu.be/uVJL-yyhGr8h - I’ll let you know how it goes 😂 

[gippslandhome]

Absolutely love it @Mathy . I love the look of that idea. Awesome job. Definitely let us know how you go with that one.

And little Macka from Mackas Planter Boxes Post says don't forget the PPE. wink wink

😂😂😂😂👍