Tiling the kitchen floor

After spending the morning digging ourselves out of the snow from Nemo last Saturday, David spent the afternoon doing his best to level the biggest dips in the kitchen floor.  This was done by first smoothing mortar onto the sub-floor, and then placing pieces of concrete board in the mortar. The center portion of the floor (in line with the chimney) is still higher than the rest of the floor, but bringing up the edges to match the center would have made the whole floor too high. 

After the mortar for the leveled areas had dried, David covered the entire floor with a layer of mortar followed by a layer of concrete board. According to the backer board website, putting a layer of mortar under the concrete board helps minimize deflections in the tile, thereby extending its lifespan and reducing the chance of cracking. The concrete board is also screwed into the floor - with a total of 800 screws! 

Next to go in was the tile. We chose a 12 inch ceramic tile from Home Depot and 3/16 inch spacers. To cut the tiles along the perimeter we used a tile saw borrowed from my Uncle Dan. The strategy here is to cut and space a small section of tile, and then to use a trowel to put mortar down on the concrete board and press the tiles into the mortar.

The last step to installing the tile floor was filling the spaces with grout and then wiping the tiles clean. David used a fancy tub of epoxy grout because it doesn't require sealing and is more stain resistant. I helped by washing the tiles and smoothing the grout at the end! The finished floor looked superb.

More kitchen renovation pictures: https://plus.google.com/photos/111337432367013111703/albums/5846031753827674593?authkey=CJXUo6L4muCRIQ